外文翻译越南港口效率和竞争力体系的分析.doc

本科毕业论文外文翻译
外文题目：An Analysis of the Efficiency and Competitiveness of Vietnamese Port System
出 处 Department of Maritime Business
作 者：Vinh Van Thai and Devinder Grewal
原 文：
An Analysis of the efficiency and Competitiveness of Vietnamese Port System
by Vinh Van Thai and Devinder Grewal
ABSTRACT
Ports, as one of the important links between different modes of transport within the logistics chain, have special essence since their efficiency and competitiveness will certainly have an impact on the chain, and hence the national and regional economy. Vietnam, as a developing country gradually integrating into the regional and global economy, is rationalizing its economic sectors, including transportation. In this environment, ports play a vital role for the purpose of achieving comparative advantages in the international market. However, the Vietnamese port system is burdened with out dated work practices, low efficiency and poor competitiveness compared to other ports in the region. This paper identifies some of the problems in the Vietnamese port system and proposes strategies to address them.
Keywords: Vietnam, port, efficiency, competitiveness, analysis
INTRODUCTION
The paper is organized in four main sections. The first part sets the general background and overview on port geography in Vietnam. The second section addresses the issues of efficiency and competitiveness of the Vietnamese port system. The third part proposes some development strategies based on previous discussions, followed by the last section that sums up the paper.
General back ground
Vietnam is located in the Indochina peninsula in South East Asia and shares the borders with China in the North, Laos and Cambodia in the West and has her East coast facing the South China Sea. The country is situated within the tropical zone and has a tropical monsoon climate. As Vietnam is a narrow and long country stretching from the south of China down to the Gulf of Thailand, the seasons also vary from the north to the south of the country. In the north, there are visibly four seasons; however, the southern part of the country experiences only two seasons all year round, namely the tropical dry and the tropical wet. As far as tidal regimes are concerned, ports in the north see mainly the diurnal tidal regime while in the central region there is a combination of semi-diurnal, irregular semi-diurnal and irregular diurnal regimes. In the south, the tidal regimes in existence are semi-diurnal and irregular semi-diurnal.
Brief overview on port geography in Vietnam
Vietnam has more than 3,000kilometres of coast line stretching from north to south of the country. The Vietnamese port system consists of both ports along the coast line and the ones located on rivers. According to Vietnam Maritime Bureau (VINAMARINE, 2023), there are currently more than 90 ports which can receive vessels on international voyages and several dozen of other ports for internal trade. The Vietnam Port Association (VPA)，which now has 40 members all of whom are capable of serving vessels on international voyages, has the annual cargo through put of more than 80% of the country’s total.
Analysis of the Vietnamese Port System
In this part of the study the efficiency and competitiveness of the Vietnamese port system will be analysed and discussed. The main issues involving port institutional and administrative regimes, as well as port operation and management will be covered to reveal the contemporary problems as far as efficiency and competitiveness are concerned. Where necessary, comparison will be conducted between the Vietnamese ports and some others in the ASEAN and ESCAP region to further illustrate the analysis and discussion.
Institutional and administrative issues
From a holistic point of view, the institutional and administrative issues of a port system are very important to provide initial information about its efficiency and competitiveness. In this section, different categories of port management body as well as the role of port authorities in Vietnam will be analysed and discussed.
Port management body in Vietnam
The port management system in Vietnam is very diversified. Examples include:
VINAMARINE, which is under direct control and management of the Ministry of Transport, manages three ports – Nghe Tinh Port,Qui Nhon Port and Nha Trang Port.
VINALINES (Vietnam National Ship ping Lines), which is also under direct control and management of the Ministry of Transport ，is the state-owned company responsible for shipping activities in Vietnam. It man ages: Hai Phong Port and Quang Ninh Port in the north, Da Nang Port in the central, Sai Gon Port and Can Tho Port in the south.
Local governments, such as cities and provinces, also take part in port management. For instance, Ben Nghe Port is directly under super vision and management of Department of Transport and Public Works of Ho Chi Minh City.
Some state-owned corporations, which are under control of provinces and cities, also manage ports. This is the case of Hon Khoi Port managed by a salt company under control of People’s Committee of Khanh Hoa province.
The participation of private sector in port management in Vietnam is still very limited. Nationally, there are only two ports that have the private sector’s participation so far: Ba Ria Serece in Phu My (Vung Tau province) as the joint-venture between Norway, French and Vietnamese partners; VICT as the joint-venture between NOL of Singapore, Mitsui & Co. of Japan and Southern Waterborne Trans port Company of Vietnam. These ports are under direct control and management of both Ministry of Transport and Ministry of Planning and Investment.

The role of Port Authority
The definition of term ‘port authority’ and its functions in Vietnam is very different from other countries in the world. In 1977, a port authority was defined as ‘State, Municipal, public or private body, which is largely responsible for the tasks of construction, administration and sometimes the operation of port facilities and, in certain circumstances, for security’ (World Bank Port Reform Toolkit, 2023). This definition is sufficiently broad to accommodate the various port management models existing in the world. It also indicates that the port authority plays an important strategic role with wide responsibilities. In most cases, the port authority is the landowner and it can work out general guide lines for strategic development of owned ports and terminals.
Port operation and management
In parallel with institutional and administrative issues identified above, various operational and management problems at selected key ports can also been identified.
Pricing policy
The practice of maritime dues and fees at ports in Vietnam is also as diversified as the port administration and management system. Current framework of fees and dues are regulated by different government agencies as follows:
The Ministry of Finance regulates rates for tonnage fee, aids-to-navigation (ATN) fee, wharf age and documentary fee.
The Government’s Pricing Committee regulates rates for pilot age, tug service, mooring and unmooring, wharf age (elaborated from rates regulated by Ministry of Finance), opening and closing hatches, cleaning of hatches, rubbish collection, water supply, tallying, cargo handling charge, cargo storage charge and equipment hire/leasing.
Tariff analysis
The following tables indicate a comparative analysis between two cases of 3,000 TEU class ship and 1,100 TEU class ship visiting ports in the ESCAP region. Port tariff is compared in terms of both nominal exchange rate and purchasing power parity.
Productivity
In order to further examine the efficiency of current Vietnamese ports, it is necessary that some key performance indicators are analysed. The following records indicate current handling productivity in normal working conditions:
It can be clearly seen from the above that handling productivity at key Vietnamese ports, with the exception of VICT, is still relatively low compared with other ASEAN ports in the region which can reach about 25 boxes per unit crane per networking hour. This can be partly explained by the absence of specialized handling equipment like ship-to-shore gantry cranes at some ports, skills of crane drivers, as well as internal management problems. Handling productivity at the quay is very important since it directly relates to the vessel’s turnaround time in ports, meaning the economic justification for ship operators. However, ports also have a responsibility to en sure efficiency in their landside operations to sustain any benefits of efficiency in quayside operations.
Administrative procedures
Vietnamese ports are known for their cumber some administrative procedures for ships using their services. Before the Prime Minister’s Decree No.55/2023/QD-TTg dated 23/04/2002 on reform of administrative procedures at sea ports came into effect on 01/07/2023 with experimental application at Sai Gon Port, the ship’s agent needed to gather more than 30 types of documents for a ship to visit Vietnamese ports. Moreover, it was also time-consuming since he had to arrange himself to pick up all related agencies such as port authority, customs, immigration, medical officer etc for the same ship and take them onboard. In practice, it took about half day to gather all necessary related agencies, and about the same amount of time to bring them onboard and finish the job. This lengthened the ships’ waiting time.
The reform of administrative procedures at seaports stipulated that the port authority is the agency to coordinate with all other related agencies, and the ship’s agent only needs to submit necessary documents to the port authority. As a result of these reforms, in Ho Chi Minh City area, the number of vessel calls has increased by 30% after one year of implementation. However, such a reform has to be extended to all other ports.
Equipment and facilities
Facilities and equipment make up the “hard ware” of any ports and terminals. Al though they cannot provide an actual judgment as productivity and utilization indicators they are still important factors to evaluate the suit ability and capacity of ports and terminals in response to customers’ requirements. The following table provides a summary of facilities and equipment at selected key ports.
Vietnam is still at the preliminary stage of containerisation compared with other ASEAN ports in the region, and the average share of containerised cargo at ports is still modest (about 30%). The ratio of containerised cargo through Vietnamese ports in 1995 was merely 18.7%, yet it has increased to 25.8% in 2023 and 28.2% in 2023 (AEAN, 2023). If we compare this tendency with current investment in specialized handling equipment for container operation at ports, there appears non-equivalence between growing demand and current capacity. As can be seen from Table12, there are only eight ship-to-shore gantry cranes and 21 RTGs for yard handling at the moment in Vietnam, nationwide. Equipment for handling break-bulk and general cargo is out-of-date and delivers low productivity; some of them, such as KIROV cranes at Hai Phong Port, have been in operation for decades.
Software: IT and EDI application
Today, IT and EDI in shipping and port operation and management are vital and make up the “soft-ware” or the “Information structure” of any port or terminal. The advantages of such soft ware are to eliminate human error, save time, simplify procedural documents and to enhance overall efficiency by the accurate relay of information and data. Moreover, IT and EDI also bring about the tangible advantage of laying the foundation for ecommerce and business in ports and terminals. The application of IT and EDI in ports and terminals can be broadly identified at two levels:
Internal management system: this means all related departments and sections within a port are linked with each other. Information and data from all users and clients of the port enters a gate and is relayed to relevant areas for further processing/planning. The system allows all operational activities to be planned from one source of information.
Links with users and clients, such as customs, shipping lines, forwarders, shippers, consignees, and external logistics providers .In this sense, multiple entry and errors are, as much as possible, eliminated since all documents are transmitted electronically, and each user is able to access information as needed. This includes pre-arrival information like cargo manifests, crew lists, etc to be submitted to the port and customs.
Hinterland connection
The port’s hinter land is defined as the area behind the port in which total logistics cost for the shipment coming to/from it is the minimum compared with other rival ports. This area is also shaped by customer bases which are attracted by the efficiency of the ports’ services. The means of connection of a port to its hinter land include road (high way), rail way and Inland Water -way (IW). Since a port can be connected with its hinter land by road, rail or in land water way, the total logistics cost of the shipment is influenced by the following factors:
The road condition and any hindrances (toll stations, traffic congestion status) that will affect the shipment’s transit time and costs
Whether the high way, rail way and IW to the port are linked with the regional or national traffic networks.
The competition levels between modes of transport.
Regulatory requirements on the modes of transport(environmental, operational, societal, etc)
Coordination of activities
One of the main indicators used to evaluate the flexibility and reliability of a port is the coordination of related activities, such as tug operations, pilotage, cargo operations, banking, logistics and emergency services. The business process flows of these activities must be linked with a normal day’s operations. From this, respective activity with non-coordinated time can be identified, and this can partly reflect the flexibility and reliability of a port.
Ports in Ho Chi Minh City area con tribute about 75% of the national container through put annually, and they are competing fiercely to gain more market share. This high level of competition has led these ports to develop similar business and work procedures, relative to the time taken for each procedure. They are grouped as one in the following comparison table.
Human resource development
Human resource is a crucial as set of any company. This is, ironically, also the issue on which efficiency and competitiveness of port operation and management depend. Over staffing is one of the elements of this issue.
With the exception of Phu My Port and VICT, which are in the private sector, all other Vietnamese ports are state-owne