Creating a foundation to improve the lives of ethnic minorities

After more than 3 years of implementing the National Target Program 1719, period 2021-2025, Yen Bai province has achieved encouraging results in solving the shortage of residential land, housing, and production land for ethnic minorities. These efforts have created an important foundation, contributing to improving the lives of ethnic minorities in the province.

Ethnic minorities in Yen Bai province participate in building rural infrastructure from the National Target Program 1719. Photo: Thach Phong.

Yen Bai is a mountainous province in the North, located in the center of the mountainous and midland regions of the North, with a poverty rate higher than the national average. Yen Bai currently has 46 particularly disadvantaged communes, and the central budget still has to ensure over 80% of the province's expenditure.

Therefore, in recent years, Yen Bai province has paid special attention to supporting residential land and production land for ethnic minority and mountainous areas. This is considered an important step, creating motivation for people to have conditions to escape poverty sustainably in many localities in the province.

Tram Tau is a mountainous district of Yen Bai province, with steep mountainous terrain, ethnic minorities living scattered on high mountain slopes. In recent times, the district has implemented many specific measures to solve the shortage of housing and residential land for local people. Tram Tau District People's Committee has established a Program Steering Committee, assigned tasks and developed a detailed plan. In 2023, the district completed the construction of 369 houses with a total cost of more than 19 billion VND.

In 2024, the district plans to continue building 386 houses with a budget of more than 20 billion VND. In addition to housing support, Tram Tau district also focuses on relocating households living in protected forests, special-use forests or areas with frequent natural disasters, flash floods, and landslides out of dangerous areas. Local authorities have also actively sought land for migrating households and mobilized people to donate land or exchange residential land for production land.

In Luc Yen district, the district People's Committee has organized a review of households that are subjects of Project 1 and selected the most difficult households with the most urgent needs, and promoted and mobilized families to mobilize all resources to eliminate temporary and dilapidated houses and issued an implementation plan. The district has approved support for 183 houses with a total support budget of more than 8 billion VND from the Program, the provincial budget and other legally mobilized sources.

To overcome difficulties and achieve the set goals, Luc Yen district continues to thoroughly grasp and promote propaganda to raise awareness of sustainable poverty reduction, creating unity among Party committees, Party organizations, authorities and the whole society, especially at the grassroots level. From there, strongly promote the tradition of solidarity and the spirit of "mutual love and support" of the nation.

However, through the implementation of Project 1, Yen Bai province, like many other localities in the country, has encountered many difficulties, especially the issue of clean land funds for allocating residential land and production land to ethnic minorities. Currently, this land fund is still lacking, not concentrated, fragmented and far from people's residences, causing difficulties in arranging land in accordance with the customs and living habits of the ethnic minorities. The implementation of land conversion and transfer between households also faces obstacles due to small land areas, below the permitted land division limit, causing the project implementation process to be prolonged.

To address this situation, the Yen Bai Provincial People's Council recently met and passed Resolution 75/2024 regulating land support policies for ethnic minorities in the province. The Resolution applies to ethnic minority households and individuals who have received land support according to the provisions of Clause 1, Article 4, but during the process of using the land, they lose land due to natural disasters, landslides, subsidence, or are affected by other natural disasters that make it impossible to use, they will continue to be considered for support policies according to the provisions of Clause 1, Article 4 of this Resolution.

In particular, in the process of developing a land support plan, the district-level People's Committee must prioritize support for households and individuals without residential land or production land first, then consider support for households and individuals lacking residential land or production land. Households and individuals who have been supported with agricultural land for production, when renting land for non-agricultural production facilities, will not be exempted from land rent.

According to Tran Xuan Thuy, Head of the Ethnic Minorities Committee of Yen Bai province, implementing the National Target Program 1719, Yen Bai province has issued many support policies to eliminate hunger, reduce poverty, and improve the living standards of ethnic minorities and mountainous areas. In particular, implementing Project 1 on solving the shortage of residential land, housing, production land, and domestic water according to the program. Many ethnic minority households in difficult circumstances have been supported to build new houses and provide domestic water, contributing to helping people reduce poverty, providing a fulcrum for people to have more motivation and peace of mind to develop the economy.

Therefore, Yen Bai province proposes that the Government decentralize to localities the decision to allocate central budget capital for contents, sub-projects, and component projects, so that it can be flexible according to the actual needs of the locality, the disbursement capacity to improve the efficiency of capital use of the Program. This will give localities flexibility in the process of project implementation, ensuring the lives of people in remote areas.

Source: https://daidoanket.vn/tao-nen-tang-nang-cao-doi-song-vung-dong-bao-dan-toc-10293717.html