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Financial difficulties have so far deferred the relocation of higher education institutions to the spacious outskirts of Ho Chi Minh City, according to the local Department of Planning and Architecture (DPA).

In 2006 the city approved a plan to relocate junior colleges and universities with small campuses to suburban areas in a bid to ease traffic pressure in central districts.

But nothing much has been done ever since, which DPA vice director Nguyen Hoai Nam says is mainly due to the economic downturn.

Nam explains that a sluggish property market should be blamed first because school managers hoped to reap big money from selling current campuses for the relocation work.

“However, nobody would offer a good price for the campuses now as the market has been frozen for years,” he says.

He shifts the blame next to the Ministry of Planning and Investment and the Ministry of Finance, which he says have been instructed by the government to arrange funding for the city.

“They have yet to work out a financial mechanism for the repositioning as requested by the government,” the official complains.

It is going to cost a huge amount of money to move these schools to the suburban areas, Nam stresses, adding that some may stay put in the relocation plan, depending on their history and significance.