Traditionally, Vietnamese people try to have a happy Tet no matter how hard their lives are during the preceding year. First of all, a tray of dishes must be prepared to offer to their ancestors on New Year’s Eve, and then children are given new toys and the elderly are provided with new clothes. With the Government’s decision, the poor will have the chance to enjoy a proper Tet celebration. 

Under the decision, each of the poor will receive VND200,000 in financial assistance, or on average each household will receive VND1 million, and total funding will amount to VND3,800 billion. It will benefit those living in mountainous and island areas and areas inhabited by ethnic minority groups, workers laid off as a result of scaled-down production, and poor households in rural and urban areas alike.

Earlier, in his open letter, the Deputy Prime Minister cum Minister of Education and Training, Nguyen Thien Nhan, emphasised the need to ensure a happy Tet for teachers at pre- and primary schools. This fits in with the Government’s goal of giving priority to ensuring social welfare, showing how the Party and State have taken care of the poor who are facing countless difficulties as a consequence of global financial turmoil, natural disasters and epidemics.

A host of practical measures have been adopted to carry out the Government’s programme to support poverty reduction in a rapid and sustainable manner, bringing direct benefit to millions of poor people in 61 districts across the country.

Accordingly, households that are assigned to take care of forests will receive VND200,000/ha/year. For those who cannot live on the allowance at first, each of them will be provided with VND5 million/ha and an additional 15kg of rice/person/month. 

Poor households will enjoy all products produced on their allotted forest land and receive between VND2-5 million to buy saplings for every hectare of forests. They will be lent VND5 million over two years with a zero-percent interest rate to purchase cattle and be provided with VND1 or 2 million each to build shelters for the cattle.

Those living in border areas will be provided with 15kg of rice/person/month. Investment capital will be poured into these areas to build infrastructure facilities, support economic restructuring and produce agro-forestry products with a focus on protecting the ecology of the environment.

Vietnam now has 797 communes of 61 districts in 20 provinces living under the poverty line. The Government aims to reduce the number of poor households by 10 percent by the end of 2010. This means several hundreds of households will escape poverty every year.