Upgraded roads have facilitated people's travel in Long An province (Photo: VNA) Long An (VNA) – The Mekong Delta province of Long An expects to raise 11 trillion VND (484 million USD) in funding for new-style rural building projects in 2018 as the province aims to have nine more communes and one district earn the status this year.
According to the provincial Department of Agriculture and Rural Development, roughly 90 percent of the funding, 9.85 trillion VND (433.4 million USD), will be taken from loans. Of the remainder, 243 billion VND (10.7 million USD) will be provided by the national programme on new-style rural building while 204 billion VND (nearly 9 million USD) will be sourced from the private sector and community donations.
Some 80.7 percent of the total will be allocated to support rural production and business while 12.3 percent will be budgeted for housing and transport projects.
The province hopes to have 63 communes meet 15-18 out of 19 criteria and none satisfy below 10 criteria.
[Ministry raises new-style rural area building goal to 39 percent]
To this end, Long An plans to continue raising public awareness of new-style rural building and accelerating the social movement to join hands to build new-style rural areas between 2016 and 2020.
At the same time, the province will boost hi-tech agriculture as part of efforts to restructure local agriculture and improve incomes for local people. It will also work to support the development of the cooperative economy, cooperatives and effective business models, promote links between production and distribution and get farmers involved in large-scale farms.
It is increasingly challenging to implement the new-style rural building programme as standards are higher than previously and funding is limited, said Chairman of the provincial People’s Committee Tran Van Can.
Last year, Long An had 59 communes, or 35.5 percent, recognised as new-style rural communes, achieving 14 criteria on average. More than 90 percent of the communes satisfied standards on irrigation, electricity access, information access and communications, employment, security and defence.-VNA
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