On September 11, 2024, the Government issued Decree 112/2024/ND-CP detailing on Agricultural Land Designated for Rice Cultivation ("Decree 112") replacing Decree 35/2015/ND-CP ("Decree 35"). Due to the important role of rice cultivation in ensuring food security in our country, Decree 112 supplements specific regulations to protect and develop Rice Cultivation Land in a sustainable and effective direction. Accordingly, Decree 112 also has many regulations in the direction of strengthening obligations for investors of projects to build works on Rice Cultivation Land, specifically as follows:
1.The investor must apply for approval Plan to use the topsoil layer before officially submitting the application for change of use purpose of rice cultivation land to non-agricultural land
Decree 112 stipulates in the direction that the topsoil use plan is an independent legal procedure carried out by the investor and must be approved by the provincial-level People's Committee (in case the project has a land area specializing in rice cultivation in 2 or more districts) or the district-level People's Committee. The approved topland use plan is a component of the dossier of application for change of land use purpose for rice cultivation to non-agricultural purposes (instead of the past, this plan only needs to be prepared, submitted and will be considered together with the rest of the documents in the dossier of application for change of land use purpose).
The separation of procedures for applying for approval of the topsoil use plan shows the importance of the plan and requires the project investor to take appropriate measures to protect the land when registering to convert rice land for non-agricultural purposes.
2. Investors of agricultural projects must comply with strict conditions when building works in direct service of agricultural production on rice cultivation land
Decree 112 requires construction works directly serving agricultural production on rice cultivation land to comply with the following conditions:
- Do not affect irrigation works, dike works, traffic in the field, adjacent rice cultivation land area;
- The work is only allowed to build 01 floor, not a basement;
- The area of rice cultivation land permitted to build works must be concentrated, with an area of at least 50 hectares;
- Works serving the prescribed purposes.
However, Decree 112 also clearly stipulates that the investor who builds the above-mentioned works does not have to change the land use purpose and the land on which the works have been built is still counted as rice cultivation land.
3. Financial obligations of investors when converting rice land for non-agricultural purposes
In general, Decree 112 inherits the spirit of Decree 35 when stipulating that people who are allocated or leased land by the State for non-agricultural purposes must declare the area of land specializing in rice cultivation and pay money to protect and develop rice land. However, Decree 112 more clearly stipulates the milestone of implementation of procedures and sanctions when violating financial obligations, specifically:
+ Investors shall pay money for the protection and development of rice cultivation land after obtaining a decision on land allocation or land lease issued by a competent state agency.
+ Within 07 days from the date of receipt of the land allocation or land lease decision, the investor shall send the declaration of land area specializing in rice cultivation to the district-level natural resources and environment agency or the provincial-level natural resources and environment agency (for works with land area specializing in rice cultivation in 2 or more districts) to request determination of the land area specializing in rice cultivation must pay money. The natural resources and environment agency will determine the land area and transfer it to the finance agency of the same level to determine the payable amount.
+ Within 30 days, the investor shall pay the money according to the notice of the financial institution.
+ Past the above time limit, the payment has not been completed, except for force majeure cases such as material damage due to natural disasters, disasters, epidemics, fires or unexpected accidents, the investor must pay additional late payment interest at the rate of 0.03%/day calculated on the late payment amount;
Decree 112 takes effect from September 11, 2024./.
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