Community management helps Ninh Thuan protect forests

 

Ninh Thuan (VNA) - The south central province of Ninh Thuan has expanded a programme to allot forests to local communities to manage and built related livelihood models to help improve people’s lives.

It plans to allocate nearly 66,000ha this year.

Tran Ngoc Hieu, head of the Thuan Nam District Coastal Protective Forest Management Board, said the board is in the process of allocating 2,147ha of forests to four local communities and another 2,500ha to local troops.

The four communities in Phuoc Nam, Phuoc Dinh and Phuoc Diem communes have 70 households, he said.

Handing over responsibility to communities has helped protect forests, especially from fires during the last dry season, he said.

The province has developed a number of livelihood models meant for households that have been allocated forests like animal husbandry and growing fruit trees and other high - value plants in those forests.

It has given them soft loans to buy cows, goats and sheep and seedlings and taught them farming techniques.

The province has built infrastructure for clean water supply, irrigation works and roads in disadvantaged areas and provided training in fire prevention for forest management.

The province has handed over 69,120ha of forests to communities since 2016, according to its Forest Protection Sub-department.

Ninh Thuan, which has the least rainfall in the country, has more than 204,200ha of forests.   

It plans to afforest more than 3,000ha this year as it targets forest cover of 47 percent by the end of this year./.