HCMC - The total quarrying capacity of companies licensed to supply building materials for the North-South expressway is below demand, leading to some components of the expressway possibly falling behind schedule.

According to the Transport Construction Investment Management Authority under the Ministry of Transport, some 10 components of the North-South expressway in the 2021-2025 period from Ha Tinh to Khanh Hoa provinces will need 71.35 million cubic meters of rock, sand and soil. However, the material suppliers cannot meet the demand, said a representative of the Transport Construction Investment Management Authority. Expressway construction projects will be short of around 20 million cubic meters of sand, rock and soil in total in the coming time given the current mining capacity of the active companies. Earlier, the Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment told localities to remove hindrances to the mining of construction materials. But these localities are concerned about time-consuming procedures to take back land at quarrying sites. The Ministry of Transport has proposed the Government urge provinces to add soil and sand mines to their zoning plans to make them available for mining by the contractors upon execution of the projects.