Vu Dinh Anh said the ceiling price should be the retail one, not the producer price. Enterprises would be allowed to sell their products and services lower than the ceiling price, encouraging them to save costs.—Photo baohaiquan

HA NOI (Biz Hub)— The Government should stipulate ceiling prices for essential goods such as petroleum, oil and electricity for businesses which have a monopoly in the market, thus preventing them from making their prices too expensive for customers.

This was a proposal made by economist Vu Dinh Anh at a seminar, held in Ha Noi on Tuesday, to discuss solutions to complete a State management mechanism for the prices of essential goods and services set by monopolistic businesses in the market.

Anh said the ceiling price should be the retail one, not the producer price. Enterprises would be allowed to sell their products and services lower than the ceiling price, encouraging them to save costs.

He added that management agencies should include taxes, businesses costs and workers' salary to calculate the ceiling price. Enterprises therefore would strive to reduce costs instead of increasing prices.

Businesses would have to lower their selling prices to increase their market share, he said.

Nguyen Anh Tuan, head of the Finance Ministry's Price Management Department, said prices of goods and services played an important role in the economy. The State management on some goods and services has been vital.

However, Tuan said the management on essential goods of monopolistic businesses has seen shortcomings.

Sharing this idea, Nguyen Minh Phong, head of the Ha Noi Institute for Socio-Economic Development's Economic Research Division, said the Viet Nam National Coal and Mineral Industries Group (Vinacomin), the Electricity of Viet Nam (EVN) and wholesale petroleum trading companies were allowed to increase selling prices in a road map, causing concerns among people about the possibility of increasing prices because these were monopolistic enterprises.

Phong said businesses asked to implement market prices, while petroleum, oil, electricity and coal have not had a competitive market.

EVN has not separated generation power companies, while Viet Nam National Petroleum Corporation (Petrolimex) accounted for a half of the petroleum market.

He said it was difficult to bring the essential prices for goods close to the world market because the country does not have a complete competitive market.

Economist Ngo Tri Long, former deputy head of the Price Management Department, said the electricity sector included three phases of power generation, transmission and distribution.

However, EVN controls all three phases which accounts for 60 per cent of the market.

It is the reason why EVN has been monopolistic, he said, adding that the power price has been adjusted seven times in upward trend since 2009.

He said the power calculation, mostly based on EVN's production costs and compensation for losses, does not consider cost saving.

He proposed publishing price calculating methods, diversifying power resources and avoiding imports.

In addition, the Government should quickly separate the power purchasing company from EVN to create a fair competitive market.

In terms of petroleum, he said businesses stipulated selling prices themselves, which was contrary to price management in the market mechanism.

Petroleum businesses immediately proposed an increase of selling prices as soon as there was a slight increase in the world market. However, they had not reduced prices when world prices continued to decrease.

He said the Government should establish an independent agency to evaluate the prices of monopolistic goods, then submit suitable selling prices to the Government to ensure benefits for the people and businesses. — VNS