Thach Tung in Tra On district’s Tan My commune forinstance received a loan of 42 million VND (1,800 USD) from the Vietnam Bankfor Social Policies in 2017. He used the loan to breed oxen and has managed torise above the poverty line.
The bank’s Vinh Long province branch, since 2016,has provided loans worth a total of 1.94 trillion VND (83.2 million USD) tomore than 88,000 poor households and those eligible for policy preferences likewar martyrs' families.
The loans have helped them revamp theiragriculture and adopt efficient farming models like breeding oxen and cows andgrowing green peel and pink flesh grapefruit.
Tran Hung, director of the branch, said the softloans policies and the province’s socio-economic development programmes havecontributed much to reducing poverty, creating jobs and ensuring socialsecurity. The soft loans have helped more than 20,000 poorand near-poor households escape poverty, he said.
The bank targets that all poor and near-poorhouseholds requiring and eligible for loans get them.
The province has provided training to poorhouseholds in techniques for breeding oxen and cows and in vocational skillsfor free.
Last year nearly 1,000 poor people receivedtraining in vocational skills at a cost of 1.5 billion VND (64,350 USD) theprovince raised from various sources, including from its Fund for the Poor andsocial security programmes, according to its Department of Labour, Invalids andSocial Affairs.
The Fund for the Poor raised donations of nearly 223billion VND (9.6 million USD) in 2014 -2018 from philanthropic organisationsand individuals to support the poor, according to the local Fatherland FrontCommittee.
The committee has instituted several models forhelping the poor like building charity houses and providing rice, cows andscholarships. It built more than 8,350 charity houses in 2014-2018.
Last year, the province issued free healthinsurance cards to 27,413 poor people and 38,391 near-poor people, ensuringthat everyone in the two categories have the cards.
The rate of poor households in the province hasfallen from 6.26 percent in 2015 to 2.63 percent, or 7,363 households, lastyear.
The province plans to reduce the poverty rate to0.8 percent this year.-VNA