Newly Effective Legal Policies

New regulations on sanction administrative violations in the fields of environmental protection.

On May 24, 2021, the Government issued Decree No. 55/2021/ND-CP amending and supplementing several provisions of Decree No. 155/2016/ND-CP dated November 18, 2016, on sanction administrative violations in the field of environmental protection. Decree No. 55/2021/ND-CP has amended and supplemented acts of violation and the penalties applied to the regulations on implementation of environmental protection plans; implement the decision approving the environmental impact assessment report; carry out the Certificate of completion of environmental protection works; environmental protection in production, business, service activities or construction of projects, plans for production, business and services without an environmental protection plan or an environmental impact assessment report; environmental monitoring...

New regulations on Preliminary Environmental Impact Assessment.

On May 21, 2021, the Government approved Decree 54/2021/ND-CP on preliminary environmental impact assessment. Accordingly, the entities that must perform the preliminary environmental impact assessment are:

1. Public investment projects (except for emergency public investment projects of the national target program, component projects of a project to which decisions on investment guidelines, on investment preparation tasks, and planning tasks have been issued by the competent authority);
2. PPP projects;
3. Investment projects subject to approval for their investment guidelines as prescribed by the law on investment;
4. Investment projects are subject to the issuance of investment registration certificates, except for the case where an investment registration certificate is issued at the investor's request.

The Preliminary Environmental Impact Assessment shall focus on:

1. Assessing the conformity of the investment project location with the national environmental protection strategy, national environmental protection planning and environmental protection contents in regional planning, provincial planning and other relevant planning;
2. Identifying and predicting major environmental impacts of the investment project based on scale, production technology and location of the project;
3. Identifying sensitive environmental factors present in the investment project location according to the location selection methods (if any);
4. Analyzing, assessing and selecting a scheme regarding scale, production technology, technology for waste treatment and location of the investment project, and solutions for reducing environmental impacts;
5. Determining notable major environmental issues and environmental impacts during the environmental impact assessment.

Abolishing the regulations on recording, evaluating and dealing with the foreign exchange difference in business activities

From July 11, 2021, regulations on recording, evaluating and dealing with the foreign exchange difference in business activities under Circular No.179/2012/TT-BTC dated October 24, 2012, of the Ministry of Finance, will be fully abolished following Circular No. 37/2021/TT-BTC dated May 27, 2021, of the Ministry of Finance.

New National Technical Regulation on fire safety for houses and constructions

On May 19, 2021, the Ministry of Construction issued Circular 02/2021/TT-BXD promulgating the National Technical Regulation on fire safety for houses and constructions. Specifically, this regulation prescribes general requirements for fire safety for rooms, houses and construction works and is mandatory to apply in all phases of new construction, renovation, repair, or change of functions as well as the technical classification of fire for buildings, parts and components of buildings, rooms, construction materials. Accordingly, when designing building and construction works, there must be structural solutions, layout-space and engineering as follows: The building maintains overall stability and shape invariance over a certain period of time, specified by the fire resistance level of the building; Everyone in the building can evacuate to a safe area before there are any life and health-threatening risks due to the impact of dangerous factors of the fire;… In addition, the technical classification of fire for buildings, parts and components of houses, rooms, building materials and construction components is based on the following properties: Fire hazard; Fire resistance. The technical classification of fire is used to establish the requirements for fire protection for structures, rooms, buildings, parts and the entire buildings depending on their fire resistance and/or danger of the fire. The Circular takes effect from July 5, 2021, and replaces Circular No. 01/2020/TT-BXD dated April 6, 2020, promulgating QCVN 06:2020/BXD on Fire safety for houses and buildings.