Jul 1, 2025
146/2025/ND-CP; 235/2025/ND-CP; 26/2026/ND-CP; 137/2026/ND-CP
OverdueConsolidated Decree on Decentralization of State Authority in Industry and Trade (Updated Through 2026)
This document is a consolidated version of Decree No. 146/2025/ND-CP (effective July 1, 2025) merged with three later amending decrees: Decree 235/2025/ND-CP (industrial promotion, effective October 15, 2025), Decree 26/2026/ND-CP (chemicals, effective January 17, 2026), and Decree 137/2026/ND-CP (multi-level marketing, effective July 1, 2026). It transfers approval and licensing authority away from the Prime Minister and the Ministry of Industry and Trade (MOIT) down to MOIT itself or to provincial People's Committees, across 25 chapters covering almost every sector MOIT regulates: oil and gas, chemicals, trade promotion, petroleum retail, LPG/LNG/CNG gas trading, tobacco, alcohol, market development, industrial explosives, electrical safety, occupational health and safety, import-export trade, trading activities of foreign-invested enterprises, food safety, product quality, electricity, consumer protection, e-commerce, energy efficiency, minerals, supporting industries, and automobiles.
For businesses operating in these conditional business lines, the most important change is which agency now receives and processes applications. Many licenses and certificates that previously required approval from MOIT or the Prime Minister, such as alcohol production and distribution licenses, LPG/LNG/CNG export-import certificates, and tobacco raw-material processing permits, are now handled by provincial People's Committees or the Minister of Industry and Trade. Detailed procedures sit in 16 appendices to the original decree, so businesses should check the appendix matching their industry to identify the correct new authority and avoid filing with the wrong agency.
The decree also sets general principles: agencies receiving delegated authority bear full responsibility for exercising it, the state budget funds the resources needed, and procedures involving fees continue to follow existing fee regulations. The entire decentralization framework stays in effect until March 1, 2027, unless extended by a law or National Assembly resolution, or superseded earlier by new legislation in the relevant sector.