Improving the investment situation and developing economic partnerships in urban management

According to the social reporter of Fars news agency, Maitham Mozafar, the head of the budget committee of the Islamic Council of Tehran, attended the international conference on investment opportunities of the city of Tehran in Milad Tower, Tehran, as a special speaker of the specialized panel with the presence of 70 managers in the field of investment and the participation of metropolitan municipalities, in four general topics. Under the title of bureaucratic challenges, legal challenges, economic challenges and technical challenges, he explained 30 complications in the field of private sector investment with municipalities.

He pointed out: In the legislative field for investment matters and private sector participation with municipalities, it is necessary to amend and approve the bill on the participation and attraction of investments by municipalities in the Islamic Council of the Islamic Council and to set the plan by the Supreme Council of the Provinces, in order to create supporting and facilitating laws. A new law should be prepared and approved for this purpose in the country. For example, now in the regulations of the municipalities’ transactions, there is no heading about how the private sector invests with the municipalities, and only the categories such as the rules governing tenders and auctions are mentioned, and basically the subject of investment in the types of transactions is not mentioned and there are no rules. For the matter of investment, it is not determined in the regulations of the municipalities, therefore, the importance of this issue, the gap that exists and the necessity of its amendment is very high.

The member of the Tehran Islamic Council added: In the current situation, the managers reach an agreement with the investors, but formally and informally, they put the same agreed conditions to a public call for tenders or auctions so that the same investor wins and is selected so that they can compete against Regulatory institutions should be accountable, while this style leads to many complications and problems.

He continued: In the legislative field, the facilitation and support approvals of the city’s Islamic councils can also complement the growth and strengthening of private sector investment in urban management.

Mozaffar, while expressing the necessity of facilitating investment in municipalities, pointed to other challenges; The gap between the existing laws and procedures, ambiguity in the laws, the length of the licensing process, the lack of ownership documents in most of the lands in the hands of the municipalities, the attitude gap between the decisions of senior and subordinate managers, management instability and intermittent changes of managers, failure to receive appropriate guarantees and or unusual strictness in these guarantees, non-timely implementation of municipal obligations such as land delivery and real estate opponents, defects in the FS (Feasibility Study) of the defined projects and their lack of proper economic justification, as well as problems and obstacles in the transfer of ownership after the completion of the projects as He mentioned some important challenges of investing in municipalities, including Tehran Municipality.

In the end, he said: The spirit of courage and boldness must be strengthened in the municipal managers, so that while complying with the laws, the municipalities of the metropolitan cities think about big and transformative works and attract large capitals from the private sector, and in this way, in order to remove obstacles and improve the investment situation and To attract partnerships, they need to study the past situation and take corrective measures to eliminate the weaknesses, and in the first step, they should improve the investment situation in the city by adjusting the partnership development investment system, improving processes and structural reforms.

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