Tien Giang ensures power access for successful countryside building

Tien Giang (VNA) – The Mekong Delta province of Tien Giang has made efforts over the last five years to facilitate the local residents’ access to electricity to realise the national target programme on building new-style rural areas.

The State-run Tien Giang Power Company said it has spent over 240 billion VND (10.7 million USD) since 2011 on building 64 transformers with a total capacity of 1,715 kVA, and installing more than 685km of low voltage lines and nearly 54km of medium voltage lines in key communes under the programme.

The firm has directly sold electricity to more than 114,000 households province-wide and guaranteed fair electricity quality and prices.

Director Luu Thanh Nam said the business has focused resources on completing power networks to assist local communes to fulfill the electricity-related criterion in the national target programme and serve rural socio-economic development.

All communes in Tien Giang have connected with the national power grid so far, helping raise the number of new-style rural communes to 12.

The national target programme on building new-style rural areas, initiated by the Government in 2010, aims to modernise rural regions in Vietnam. It sets 19 criteria covering infrastructure, production, living standards, income and culture, among others.

As many as 1,300 communes were recognised as new-style rural localities, or 14.5 percent of the total, as of November 2015, according to a report delivered by Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development Cao Duc Phat on December 8.

Vietnam aims to have 50 percent of all communes nationwide meet all the requirements by the end of 2020.-VNA