From synchronous solutions…
After a year, more than 72,000 households in 28 districts have received allowances to care for nearly 400,000 hectares of forests. About 3,363 tonnes of rice have been provided to 6,624 poor households in 7 districts who are unable to make a living from forestry during the first years of forest planting projects.

In addition, over 7,000 households living in border hamlets and villages have received a total of 2,804 tonnes of rice, over 25,000 others have been supplied with seeds, fertilizers and cattle, and over 62,000 households have accessed zero-interest bank loans to develop production.

Construction is underway on nearly 60,000 houses for the poor, or 77 percent of the target set for 2009. Of the total, 36,300 have already been handed over to the poor.

As part of the resolution, a pilot programme to send residents to work abroad has been carried out in 28 districts. More than 2,900 have registered for the programme, 2,300 of whom met the health and educational requirements.

Businesses, in collaboration with local administrations and vocational training centres, have run training courses for foreign languages and occupational skills before sending the workers abroad. These workers have been earning stable incomes and remitted salaries to their families

Local administrations have also paid due attention to improving residents’ educational levels and vocational skills by building ethnic boarding schools and vocational training centres and sending teachers to poor communes.

To implement the official rotating policy, they have trained officials and dispatched the relevant authorities to disadvantaged areas.

Infrastructure construction has been hastened in these poor districts. In addition to schools and vocational training centres, they have built hospitals, irrigation works, roads, power stations, water supply plants, markets and cultural centres.

To make the programme more effective, Nguyen Thi Kim Ngan, Minister of Labour, Invalids and Social Affairs, says local administrations should boost education, vocational training and job generation, including labour export.

…. to business support
As many as 41 economic groups, State corporations and businesses have joined hands with the Party and State to assist 62 poor districts. Thirty-eight businesses have committed VND2,103 billion to these districts for the 2009-2020 period, of which VND697 billion was earmarked for 2009.   

These businesses have built houses for the poor to replace dilapidated ones and developed infrastructure projects to improve local residents’ production and daily lives. They have also supported vocational training to help the poor seek for jobs themselves or to recruit them to work in businesses. 

To date, VND419 billion has been invested in building more than 54,000 concrete houses (meeting 70 percent of the demand), VND167 billion has gone towards building ethnic boarding schools and granting scholarships, VND81.3 billion for vocational training, and VND56.2 billion for medical centres.

The Vietnam Rubber Group is a case in point. It established a joint stock company to encourage local residents to take part in rubber tree planting projects which have created steady jobs for thousands of labourers earning more than VND4 million a month.

The Vietnam Garments and Textile Group established a garment company in Son Dong district, Bac Giang province, with a total capitalisation of VND42 billion, that is employing 1,000 local labourers.

Huynh Dam, President of the Vietnam Fatherland Front Central Committee, says economic groups, State corporations and businesses not only play the leading role in the national economy, but also show their corporate social responsibility for community work by taking part in poverty reduction projects in poor districts.

Ambitious target for 2010
The government aims to reduce the number of poor households in poor districts to below 40 percent by 2010. To meet the target, localities are required to complete the allocation of land and forests to poor people and provide food to those living in difficult-to-cultivate areas in order to improve their living conditions.

In 2010, Vietnam will strive to make a breakthrough in agro-forestry production to improve people’s lives in poor districts. Provinces benefiting from the programme will speed up infrastructure construction in rural areas, increase research and the application of scientific and technological advances, and ensure more than 25 percent of their labour force will be suitably trained.