Livelihood solutions are said to be important to ensure sustainable poverty elimination (Photo: VNA) Thai Nguyen (VNA) – A meeting in northern ThaiNguyen province on July 31 emphasised the need for livelihood solutions tosustainably reduce poverty in local ethnic minority groups.
Nguyen Duc Bach, Director of the institute forenvironmental science and social issues, said aside from support under theState’s policies and programmes, livelihood solutions are important to ensuresustainable poverty elimination.
Echoing this, other participants notedcommunication to raise public awareness is also one of the most importantsolutions, saying that not only ethnics but also cadres in the politicalsystem, especially at the grassroots level, need to improve their awareness inthis work.
While livelihood support policies should bebuilt basing on ethnics’ demand, the transfer of scientific and technologicaladvances must also match local culture.
They suggested Thai Nguyen form a contingent ofcadres and prestige persons in each ethnic minority area because issuesrelating to ethnics’ livelihoods and culture must be decided by themselves andcarried out with the help of local prestige people.
The province should increase resources forcreating sources of livelihood for ethnic minority people, participants said,asking authorities to prioritise preferential loans for residents in remoteareas and low-income earners to develop production activities.
According to a report at the meeting, over thepast years, ethnic minority people in Thai Nguyen have gained access to softloans and support for agricultural production and received training in farmingtechniques. The material and spiritual life of the poor in ethnic minority andmountainous areas has also been improved.
However, the numbers of poor and near-poorhouseholds are still high in some localities with unfavourable naturalconditions, scattered population, underdeveloped infrastructure and loweducational level. Meanwhile, resources are sometimes not allocated in a timelymanner, thus affecting the implementation of poverty reduction policies inethnic minority communities.
According to Thai Nguyen’s board for ethnicminority affairs, in 2016 and 2017, the household poverty rate in 124 ethnicminority and mountainous communes fell 5.72 percent but the rate of near-poorfamilies rose by 0.12 percent, as measured by the multidimensional criteria.
Thai Nguyen is home to 45 ethnic minority groupsaccounting for nearly 30 percent of the province’s population. Tay, Nung, SanDiu, San Chay and Dao are the most populous minorities. –VNA
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