Ho Chi Minh City (VNA) – The Vietnam Buddhist Sangha (VBS) carried out extensive charity and social welfare activities nationwide in 2025, with total spending exceeding 2.161 trillion VND (82.27 million USD), according to a report released on January 20.
The report was presented by the VBS Central Committee's board for social charity at a conference held in Ho Chi Minh City to review Buddhist affairs in 2025.
It noted that the central board and its provincial- and city-level divisions mobilised resources to support people affected by natural disasters, disadvantaged communities, and vulnerable groups across the country.
Key activities included delivering emergency relief, granting scholarships, constructing houses for the disadvantaged, presenting bicycles and wheelchairs for the needy, as well as building bridges, wells, and rural roads.
The VBS also offered free medical check-ups and medicine distribution for poor patients, cataract surgeries to restore eyesight, and support for heart and eye operations. Additional efforts focused on caring for Heroic Vietnamese Mothers, policy beneficiary families, border guard soldiers, orphans and the elderly, as well as the operation of charity kitchens.
Building on these results, the VBS has identified charity and social welfare as a central task for 2026. The Sangha reaffirmed that such activities not only help ease hardships faced by the poor but also embody the Buddhist spirit of compassion and the Vietnamese tradition of mutual support.
Priorities for 2026 include expanding charity fundraising, implementing aid programmes at the grassroots level, and coordinating with the Vietnam Fatherland Front Committee of Ca Mau province to provide clean drinking water and standard sanitation facilities for schools. It also plans to encourage monks, nuns, and followers to join hands in establishing a Buddhist hospital, while further consolidating and expanding the Tue Tinh traditional medicine clinics nationwide./.
