Yen Bai (VNA) – Programme 135 has assisted people living inmountainous areas, especially the ethnic minority people, in northern Yen Baiprovince escape from poverty in a sustainable manner.

Yen Bai has 81 communes and 177 villages and hamlets facing extremedifficulties qualified to benefit from the Government’s Programme 135, whichwas launched in 1999 under the Prime Minister’s decision 135/1998/QD-TTg dated July31, 1998, with the aim of improving living conditions for rural residents witha particular focus on ethnic minority communities.

Ethnic minority groups account for 55.5 percent of the 30 ethnic groupsresiding in the province. They make a living based on farming and forestryproduction and account for over 80 percent of poor households in the locality.

Do Quang Vinh, deputy head of the provincial committee for ethnic affairs, saidthe Programme 135 allocated over 447 billion VND for the ethnicminority-resided and mountainous areas in the province from 2016 to June, 2018.

The money included 86 billion VND supporting production development, 351billion VND for developing infrastructure, and over 10 billion VND for capacitybuilding for the community and local officials.

Over 24,000 households have been helped to develop household-based productionto improve their living conditions, according to the provincial committee forethnic affairs.

Hong Ca commune in Tran Yen district has 90 percent of its populationbeing the Tay and Mong ethnic minority people. It had coped with extremedifficulties stemming from low education level, backward customs, and underdevelopedroads.

Programme 135 investment allowed inter-village roads to be asphalted, making iteasier for travelling and trade activities, said Song A Dung, head of Khuon Bovillage, Hong Ca commune.

For Chang A Vang from Khuon Bo village, his family had struggled againstpoverty before getting the State’s assistance in young bamboo and cinnamon plantsin 2014. They began to sell bamboos and will sell cinnamon barks in two years.

During 2015-2016, Programme 135 capital helped Hong Ca commune to build 1,700meters of roads connecting its hamlets and villages to the communal centre at acost of over 2 billion VND, and provided young cinnamon trees worth 591 millionVND for 617 families, among others.

Chang A Sai, Vice Chairman of the Hong Ca commune People’s Committee saidProgramme 135 enabled Hong Ca residents to raise their incomes, from 20 millionVND per person per year in 2016 to 28 million VND per person per year in 2018.The poverty rate was slashed from 45 percent in 2016 to 18 percent in 2018.-VNA