VietNamNet Bridge – Prime Minister Nguyen Tan Dung has approved new policies on providing residential and production land as well as ensuring clean water supplies for poor ethnic minorities and underprivileged households in disadvantaged areas during the 2013-15 period.

The beneficiaries include farming and forestry households living under the poverty line of VND400,000 per month (US$19.05), and those who don't have sufficient residential land or land for production, or those who face difficulties in accessing clean water.

Each eligible household will receive financial support of VND15 million (US$714) to support household production and/or be entrusted with an average of 200sq.m to use as residential land.

A fund of VND1.3 million ($62) will be earmarked for each household without access to safe water to fund building of water storage or a well for domestic use.

Dung Thi Phan, a 28-year-old ethnic Mong resident in central Thanh Hoa Province, said she has had to take up several temporary jobs to ensure her one-year-old child is fed, a situation she has found herself in due to a lack of agricultural land.

Phan said she hoped local authorities would soon realise the new support policy to help her and other poor households.

However, the support must be easy to access and not require complicated procedures, she said.

The government aims to provide housing and production land to 70 percent of targeted households and ensure basic clean water supplies for ethnic minority communities and poor households in disadvantaged areas by 2015.

According to the Prime Minister's decision, the beneficiaries have to use the support in appropriate ways to develop their production and improve their quality of life.

They are not allowed to transfer, lend or mortgage their production and residential land within a 10-year period from the time they are entrusted the land by the State.

New measures designed specifically for poor ethnic minority people in the Mekong Delta have also been approved, including measures on provision of land for housing and employment assistance.

Source: VNS