한국건설업체, 베트남에서 중국건설사와 경쟁..."완승" Tale of two metro lines shows battle for business in Vietnam

GS건설·대림산업, 

지하철 공사 시공관리 능력 뛰어나 

중국 업체 시행구간 공기 못맞추고

사고빈번으로 불만 폭주

파이낸셜타임스 보도

GS건설이 시공 중인 베트남 호치민시 지하철 1호선 노선도 출처 sumitomocorp.co.jp

edited by kcontents 

케이콘텐츠 편집

   국내 건설회사들이 베트남에서 중국 업체와 달리 시공 능력을 크게 인정받고 있다는 보도가 나왔다. 

파이낸셜타임스(FT)는 중국 철도엔지니어링(CREC)이 시공 중인 베트남 내 지하철 공사 과정에서 사고 발생 등으로 공사기한을 제대로 맞추지 못해 지방자치단체와 지역 주민의 불만이 커지고 있다고 지난 24일 보도했다.

이에 반해 “한국 건설회사는 공사를 안정적으로 진행하고 있다”며 “한국 건설회사에 공사를 맡기고 싶지만 이미 계약해 어쩔 수 없는 상황”이라는 발주처 반응을 덧붙였다. 

중국 건설업체의 공사 현장에선 최근 크레인이 추락해 지나가던 오토바이와 행인을 덮쳐 사망하는 사고가 발생했다. FT는 공사 현장 인근 지역 주민들이 “중국 인부들은 거북이가 걸어 다니는 것처럼 일한다”고 비난했다고 전했다.

국내 업체 중에선 GS건설과 대림산업이 베트남에서 지하철 공사를 하고 있다.

GS건설은 2012년 8월 4억2000만달러 규모의 베트남 호찌민 지하철 1호선 2공구를 수주했다. 베트남 도시철도국이 발주한 이 공사는 호찌민시 벤탄지역에서 수오이티엔 차량기지까지 총 19.8㎞를 연결하는 공사로, 2018년 1월 완공 예정이다.

대림산업은 하노이 경전철 3공구를 2014년 5월 착공해 내년 1월 준공할 예정이다. 공사비는 8400만달러 규모다. 대림산업 토목사업본부 관계자는 “국내 건설회사가 안전 및 공정 관리 측면에서 중국 등 경쟁 회사보다 뛰어나다는 평가를 받고 있다”고 말했다. 

한국경제 김진수 기자 true@hankyung.com

Tale of two metro lines shows battle for business in Vietnam

Wrong side of the tracks: a Chinese-built section of Hanoi's urban railway has come in for criticism

Michael Peel in Hanoi

A tale of two metro lines in Vietnam’s capital has thrown sharp light on how anti-China feeling plays into a battle between economic powers for sway in this frontier market.

Delays, disruption and accidents have sparked criticism of a Chinese-built section of Hanoi’s new urban railway — and unfavourable contrasts with a part of the network being worked on by a South Korean rival. 

“Of course people would prefer Koreans to do this project,” said Hang, a Hanoi food seller whose street stall is dwarfed by the elevated metro line’s towering columns. “But the government agreed for Chinese companies, so we have to trust them.” 

The narrative chimes with hostility towards Beijing, which exploded into riots in 2014 and rose again this week after the arrival of a Chinese oil rig in contested offshore waters. The rail duel also shows how popular sentiment in Communist-led Vietnam and elsewhere in Southeast Asia could shape a growing tussle between China, South Korea and Japan for business. 

The new railway is part a number of infrastructure projects aimed at relieving congestion and pollution that threaten to overwhelm the capital. Urban rail network projects in both Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City, the main commercial centre, have attracted extensive international interest. 

China Railway Engineering Corporation is building one line in Hanoi, while Daelim of South Korea has a contract for another. A consortium including Japan’s Sumitomo is working on the Ho Chi Minh City project. 

The Chinese line has come under fire after reports of deferred deadlines, cost overruns and dangers to passers-by from falling materials. The most serious accident was when a steel rod dropped from a crane, killing a man riding on his motorbike and injuring three other people, according to reports in Vietnam’s tightly policed media.

A tea seller named Nguyen, whose stand is in the shadow of a Chinese-built station where the clang of construction was ringing out, said he feared the threat of debris and was annoyed about the prolonged disruption.

“It’s like turtle walking around,” he said of the pace of the project. “I think if Japanese companies built this station, it would not be that slow.”

The Chinese work has also prompted mockery from Vietnam’s active social media, where municipal matters are politically safer targets than central government policies or officials. One much-noticed Facebook post unflatteringly compared Chinese craft with Japanese workmanship, via a pair of pictures purportedly of parts of the Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City metro lines. 

All this ought to be music to the ears of China’s rivals, including Japanese businesses that more than tripled their investment in Vietnam to $9bn between 2011 and 2014. South Korean investment in the country leapt a third higher in 2013 and 2014 than during the previous two years.

However, legitimate concerns seem mixed with a dose of prejudice. Rhetorical attacks on China by Vietnamese government officials and other commentators ran out of control in 2014, as mobs torched and ransacked foreign factories in some of the country’s industrial parks. Some Chinese companies temporarily withdraw staff and mothballed projects for fear of a repeat. 

Nor has Hanoi’s South Korean-built metro line been problem-free: two accidents involving falling heavy materials and equipment were reported in the media in May, including a toppling crane that injured a pregnant woman and a motorbike rider. The standing of South Korean companies in Vietnam was dealt a further blow in December when a Samsung official and another Korean businessman were jailed after a scaffolding collapse killed 13 workers in March at one of the conglomerate’s construction sites in the country. 

China Railway Engineering, Daelim and the Vietnamese government did not respond to questions. Many Vietnamese officials are preoccupied with the five-yearly party Congress being held in the capital. 

The Hanoi Metropolitan Railway Management Board acknowledged on its website as long ago as 2012 that “various problems” were causing “difficulties” with the metro project. Now, more than three years later, some residents next to the Chinese-built section are fed up of waiting to see whether their tale will end with the best of lines or the worst of lines.

“I don’t care who is doing the project,” sighed Huong Tran, a shop worker who complained that the construction was driving away business. “But I am not happy with it because it is taking so long.”

Additional reporting by Khac Giang Nguyen in Hanoi, Li Wan in Beijing and Song Jung-a in Seoul 

http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/dde43a4a-c0de-11e5-a8c6-deeeb63d6d4b.html#axzz3yGhxm8Tp

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