Ba Ria-Vung Tau People’s Committee on August 28 granted a certificate of investment registration for the construction of a polypropylene (PP) plant and a liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) warehouse for South Korea’s Hyosung Corporation.

Deputy secretary of the provincial Party Committee Nguyen Thi Yen (left) and chairman of the People’s Committee of Ba Ria-Vung Tau, Nguyen Van Trinh (right) hand over the investment registration certificate to the representative of Hyosung Corporation.

The construction, with total investment capital of US$1.2 billion, is the largest project ever licensed in Ba Ria-Vung Tau Province.

The project, covering an area of nearly 61 hectares at the Cai Mep Industrial Zone, will consist of two phases.

The first phase involves construction of the PP plant, which will have an annual output of 55,000 tonnes of ethylene, 600,000 tonnes of propylene, 600,000 tonnes of polypropylene in the forms of Homo and Co, 20,000 tonnes of hydrogen, as well as other by-products such as steam, inert gas and light hydrocarbons.

In the second phase, Hyosung will build a 240,000-tonne-per-year LPG underground warehouse.

According to Ba Ria-Vung Tau Industrial Zones Authority, the project has been licensed for 34 years. The construction of the plant and underground warehouse will be completed by the end of 2020 and come into operation in early 2021.

Nguyen Van Trinh, deputy secretary and chairman of the provincial People’s Committee, said the project was very important to the economic development strategy of the country in general and the province in particular, contributing about $80 million annually to the State budget.

During the construction, the project will create about 2,000 jobs and once completed, it will have a spillover effect for the development of the petrochemical industry and downstream industries such as automobiles, healthcare, plastics and other service sectors of the province and the southern economic zone, Trinh said.

He also asked relevant authorities to facilitate investment and construction procedures for Hyosung Corporation.

Hyosung is one of the 15 largest industrial conglomerates in South Korea. It has invested around $1.5 billion since its entry into Viet Nam in 2007 with the construction of a textile and industrial raw materials plant at the Nhon Trach 5 Industrial Zone in Dong Nai Province.

Ba Ria-Vung Tau Province Province has attracted 362 investment projects with total capital of over $18.2 billion to date, of which 42 projects with total capital of nearly $2.1 billion were granted investment certificates in the past eight months. — VNS