Chairman of Quang Ngai: ‘Egg-rolled’ officials drag back the province’s competitiveness

On the afternoon of May 27, the People’s Committee of Quang Ngai province held a conference to evaluate the results of the Provincial Competitiveness Index (PCI) 2025 and solutions for improvement in 2026. According to the PCI 2025 results of the Vietnam Confederation of Commerce and Industry (VCCI), Quang Ngai is the only province in the low group among the 6 groups of operating quality (from low to very good).

Chairman of Quang Ngai People’s Committee Nguyen Hoang Giang acknowledged that the PCI 2025 index has a new approach and different component criteria compared to before. He believes that the province’s low PCI ranking results come from many subjective reasons.

“Is there a situation where officials and experts make it difficult, instead of once, they are instructed to meet with businesses three times?”, he asked.

According to the head of the Quang Ngai provincial government, he once noted this and directed departments to rectify it, but the results were not satisfactory. “Before having this index, I had heard about the situation of experts ‘rolling egg rolls’, causing difficulties and causing businesses to go around in circles,” Mr. Giang said.

Of the 9 component indicators, the province can only improve 4 indicators compared to 2024, including legal institutions, fair competition, compliance costs and access to resources.

The remaining indicators such as market entry, business support policies, unofficial costs, government creation and transparency… all decreased in points and ranked near the bottom or at the bottom of the PCI rankings.

For example, in the constructive government index, Quang Ngai will decrease by 3.54 points compared to 2024, ranking 33rd nationwide. Similarly, the province’s transparency is also the lowest in the country, at position 34, with 5.3 points. Unofficial costs reached 6.12 points, ranked 33rd.

Mr. Nguyen Hoang Giang also noted the province’s characteristics, about 95% of the 10,776 operating enterprises belong to the micro and small group. In the PCI survey, their vote is as valuable as a trillion-dollar business.

“PCI is an important index, we must move to change,” he said, while encouraging officials that this is the first year of applying a new set of criteria to calculate the provincial competitiveness index, so there is still room for improvement.

At the conference, the representative of the Quang Ngai Trade and Tourism Investment Promotion Center pointed out that one of the reasons why the province’s PCI index is low is the psychology of avoidance, fear of mistakes, and fear of responsibility after the period of tightening inspection and inspection in the fields of land, investment, and bidding. Some civil servants have a “defensive” mentality, choosing the safe solution of applying mechanical regulations.

“The mentality of not doing anything is not wrong, leading to a situation where officials constantly ask for opinions at many levels or wait for instructions, instead of proactively proposing solutions,” said Mr. Le Van Tai, Deputy Director in charge of the Quang Ngai Trade and Tourism Investment Promotion Center.

The consequence, according to him, is that the business’s investment profile has to be adjusted many times, and the business’s proposals in the field of land and site clearance have not been completely resolved. Overlapping inspections and inspections also cause some businesses to accept unofficial costs to resolve work faster, according to the Center’s assessment.

Mr. Tai proposed that the province needs to simplify administrative procedures, shorten application processing time, increase information disclosure on planning, land, auctions and have policies to support businesses.

Chairman of Quang Ngai Provincial People’s Committee Nguyen Hong Giang said that the province will establish a working group and each agency and unit must propose solutions to jointly improve the PCI index next year.

The PCI index has been periodically conducted by VCCI since 2005, and is one of the indicators assessing the ability of local governments to build a business environment and attract investment. This is the first year VCCI announced this index after merging 34 provinces and cities.

PCI 2025 results are based on a survey from 3,500 domestic private enterprises, nearly 590 foreign invested enterprises (FDI) and more than 1,000 business households in 34 provinces and cities.

This year, instead of measuring the business environment of provinces, VCCI switched to evaluating the private development ecosystem, because “management must create efficiency and create a strong private business force”. The agency also switched from publishing specific rankings to executive quality groups.

Although PCI is at a low level, Quang Ngai also recorded some positive results. The province ranked 8th in the country in the Private Sector Performance Index (BPI) – measuring the development of the private sector and innovation capacity. The province is also in the top 6 localities recording GRDP 2025 at a double-digit level, budget revenue exceeding plan, nearly halving the poverty rate and public investment disbursement above the national average.