Vietnam Railways (VNR) has targeted a revenue growth of over eight per cent on last year’s figure of VND8.17 trillion, Vu Anh Minh, the corporation’s chairman, said on January 20.

Speaking at VNR’s conference on the 2018 business plan, Minh said the corporation also expected to earn an after-tax profit of VND158 billion, four billion higher than last year’s, and raise the average income of employees by 10 per cent.

To achieve the target, Minh said VNR would focus on upgrading railway infrastructure, installing 100 new engines by 2020 and building six new passenger trains as well as replacing out-of-date freight cars.

The corporation would also call for investment in projects to enhance its goods loading capacity to shorten the storage time at stations, strengthen the connection between railway and other means of transport and reduce logistic costs, Minh said.

Deputy Minister of Transport Nguyen Ngoc Dong pointed out some shortcomings that VNR was facing which needed to be addressed this year, such as restructuring its transport system to improve competitiveness and corporate management capacity at both parent company and subsidiaries.

Dong said VNR must take drastic measures so that by 2020, the railway sector would reach 2 per cent of market share in passenger transport and 3 to 4 per cent of market share in freight transport.

In an effort to provide better services to attract passengers, VNR launched six five-star trains on January 10 on the Reunification (Ha Noi-HCM City) route. — VNS