Hanoi (VNA) – Deputy PrimeMinister Le Van Thanh has emphasised the target of opening Long ThanhInternational Airport in the southern province of Dong Nai by 2025, withquality given the top priority.

As well as ensuring progress andquality, focus must be paid to preventing wastefulness and negative phenomenaduring the implementation of this roughly 5 billion-USD project to ensureinvestment effectiveness, Thanh told a meeting on April 6.

He asked the Airports Corporation ofVietnam (ACV), the project management board, and contractors to maintain threework shifts per day to accelerate the progress of construction.

Dong Nai province also needs to speedup site clearance to hand over the entire 1,810ha for the first phase and 722haof land reserves before April 30, and the whole 5,000ha for the project by Junethis year.

This is highly important and thedecisive factor for the project’s success, the Deputy PM noted.

DeputyMinister of Transport Le Anh Tuan said Dong Nai has handed over 1,589ha out of the1,810ha of land for Phase 1 and 466.79ha of the 722ha land reserves.

Chairmanof the provincial People’s Committee Cao Tien Dung pledged to complete all siteclearance by June 2022.

Covering more than 5,580 hectares, the Long Thanh International Airport will spread across six communes in Long Thanhdistrict. Its construction has been divided into three phases. 

In the first phase, a runway and one passenger terminal along with othersupporting facilities will be built to serve 25 million passengers and 1.2million tonnes of cargo each year. This phase is scheduled to be completed in2025.

The project started in 2021. Once fully completed by 2050, the airport will be able to handle100 million passengers and 5 million tonnes of cargo annually.

Located 40km to the east of Ho Chi Minh City, the airport is expected torelieve overloading at the southern metropolis’s Tan Son Nhat InternationalAirport, which is currently the largest in Vietnam./.