Speaking at the event, Minister of Labour, Invalids andSocial Affairs Dao Ngoc Dung said targets under the programme assigned by theNational Assembly were met and surpassed last year.
However, the rate of poor households remained high in remoteand mountainous areas, especially poverty relapse in case of natural disastersand flooding.
The Ministry of Labour, Invalids and Social Affairs reportedthat over 10.4 trillion VND (452 million USD) from the State budget wereearmarked for the programme last year, and more than 2.17 trillion VND (93.8million USD) from the budget of 40 out of the country’s 63 provinces and cities.
The sum from the State budget was used to support poor andnear-poor households in the fields of health care, education, housing,preferential credit, agriculture and forestry extension, and production.
Last year, over 1.9 million poor households and policybeneficiaries accessed loans from the Vietnam Bank for Social Policies. Jobswere generated for nearly 267,000 workers, about 7,000 of them were sent abroadfor term contracts while more than 1.2 million clean water supply facilitieswere built.
By the end of 2019, the poverty rate nationwide was below 4percent while that in extremely disadvantaged communes was reduced by about 3 –4 percent year-on-year.
Dung suggested reviewing the implementation of the programmein the north, central and south regions, then holding a conference to reviewthe efforts nationwide.
According to him, the programme for the 2021-2025 periodwill have new criteria, including those regarding housing construction for thepoor, especially those in mountainous regions.
Opinions at the event proposed giving priority to investingin extremely disadvantaged and ethnic minority-inhabited areas, widelyspreading the campaign “The whole nation joins hand for the poor – No one leftbehind”, monitoring policy implementation for poor households that contributedto the revolution in mountainous areas, among others.
The national target programme for 2020 aims to reducenationwide poverty rate by 1-1.5 percent per year, and 4 percent per year inpoor communes and districts under multidimensional poverty approach, improvelivelihoods and lives of the needy, increase the income of the poor householdsnationwide and those in especially disadvantaged villages, communes anddistricts 1.5-fold and two-fold, respectively from the late 2015./.