Photo booth at party

The drizzle in late February could not stop farmers of Dong Cao Village in Hanoi’s outlying district of Me Linh from pushing themselves to the fields to harvest vegetables.

The more packs of tomatoes and lettuces are delivered, the bigger hope they see to get a break-even point.

Dozens of beds of sugar beets were left unharvested while mustard greens were severely destroyed by pests.

Tomatoes, easier to be consumed, were loaded into big bags, pilling up at a front yard of Dong Cao Village Cooperative while waiting to be shipped to the city center.

“Before Tet [Vietnamese Lunar New Year], I earned VND5-6 million [US$216-260] for every 24 square meters of sugar beets. Now, no one wants to buy them,” said Thuan, a farmer in Dong Cao Village.

“Each crop of sugar beets takes 60 days.

“As it passed day 90, we can do nothing but throw them away.”

A farmer gathers sugar beets to destroy as they are too old to be sold. Photo: Ha Quan / Tuoi Tre

Song, another farmer, said the cooperative helped to connect them with traders.

“A truck loads some six tonnes of veggies to sell in cities,” he added.

A local landfill is covered up with thrown-away sugar beets. Photo: Ha Quan / Tuoi Tre

Customers, however, can pay at their will, VND5,000, VND10,000 or VND20,000 ($0.22, $0.43 or $0.87), simply to help cover transportation fees.

“Some of them take a couple of bags for VND50,000 [$2.17]. Tomato price now stops at VND1,500 per kilogram [0.65 cents], but there is hardly anyone bothering to trade it,” said Thuan.

Dam Van Dua, director of the cooperative, said local agricultural products need help to access other markets.

There are 100 tonnes of tomatoes and 200 tonnes of sugar beets waiting to be consumed.

Dua said the cooperative was working to connect farmers with traders and food distributing companies.

At present, some of these products have been delivered to Hanoi’s biggest wholesale markets of Long Bien and Xanh.

“On February 27 solely, we sold 25 tonnes of sugar beets and tomatoes. We expect to bring the rest to the markets in the next few weeks,” he said.

To avoid the abundance that leads to devastating price drops, Dua said they would pay more attention to food processing and balance the allocation of seeds in the next crops.

Me Linh District’s authorities have requested the Hanoi Department of Industry and Trade to introduce them to procurement agencies as well as setting up makeshift booths to help farmers sell vegetables.

Dong Cao Village has 140ha of vegetable farming with some 200 farmers and 400 frequent buyers.

However, under the impacts of COVID-19, traders from other provinces cannot enter the village, leading to slow consumption of agricultural products.

Bags of vegetables, up to 10kg each, are stocked before being shipped to wholesale markets in Hanoi. Photo: Ha Quan / Tuoi Tre

Mustard greens are severely destroyed by pests in Hanoi. Photo: Ha Quan / Tuoi Tre

Trucks with banners saying “joining hands to help farmers sell vegetables amid the pandemic” run to and from Dong Cao Village in Me Linh District, Hanoi. Photo: Ha Quan / Tuoi Tre

Trucks with banners saying “joining hands to help farmers sell vegetables amid the pandemic” run to and from Dong Cao Village in Me Linh District, Hanoi. Photo: Ha Quan / Tuoi Tre

Bags of tomatoes are seen piling up in front of Dong Cao Village’s cooperative in Me Linh District, Hanoi. Photo: Ha Quan / Tuoi Tre

Tomatoes and sugar beets are ready to be delivered to central Hanoi. Photo: Ha Quan / Tuoi Tre

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National unity promoted

During its 90-year history, the Vietnam Fatherland Front has always exerted efforts to perform its role as the host of campaigns and activities to mobilise resources in all social strata to contribute to the country’s socio-economic growth and ensure national defence and security.

Vice President of the Vietnam Fatherland Front Central Committee Ngo Sach Thuc says the Front has promoted patriotism, solidarity and creativity among people, which could be seen through effective implementation of its mobilisations on realising the country’s development goals and improving its people’s livelihood.

He says: “The Front has become a bridge to converge people and promote national unity. It could be seen through warm responses of people to mobilisation campaigns targeting the poor, policy beneficiaries, the disadvantaged and fellow residents affected by floods, etc.”

In the mobilisation campaign of ‘All people unite to build new-style rural areas and civilised urban areas’ in 2015, the Fatherland Front at all levels has coordinated with other agencies to call on people to donate land and strength to develop infrastructure, develop the economy, sustainably reduce poverty, protect the environment, adhere to the law, preserve and promote traditional cultural values towards building happy and civilised communities.

Thuc says, “the mobilisation has managed to call on the whole political system and a majority of people to participate and achieved comprehensive results. 60% of communes nationwide have been recognised as new-style rural areas as of 2020”.

Every year, the Fatherland Front cooperates with relevant ministries, agencies and organisations to implement the programme ‘Vietnamese people prioritise Vietnamese goods’.

From 2015 to 2020, the Fatherland Front at all levels have raised a total fund of 19.7 trillion VND (over 850,000 USD) for social welfare programmes and over 4.6 trillion VND (over 200 million USD) particularly ‘For the poor’ fund; built and upgraded over 153,000 houses for poor households; built thousands of welfare projects; assisted millions of households to develop business models, examine their health and facilitate their children to go to school.

The Fatherland Front’s member organisations have organized several programmes targeting policy beneficiaries, people with meritorious services to the nation, disadvantaged people, Agent Orange victims, people with disabilities and the underprivileged. They have also promptly assisted people affected by natural disasters and critical incidents, as well as effectively organised search and rescue missions.

As of September, 2020, the Front raised over 2 trillion VND (over 87 million USD) for the national fund for preventing and fighting COVID-19.

Performing social supervision and criticism

The Vietnam Fatherland Front has organised and co-organised 12 central-level supervision programmes on several fields, including policies towards people with meritorious services to the nation; implementation of the Law on Science and Technology; education and training reforms; agricultural supplies management, manufacturing and trading; handling complaints and denunciations at grass-root level; administration reforms, among others.

Mentioning the Fatherland Front’s achievements in social supervision and criticism, Ngo Sach Thuc says “In the past five years, provincial Fatherland Fronts have organised and participated in 4,093 supervision projects; while those at district level 22,679 projects and communal level 466,012 projects.

The Standing Committee of the Central Committee of the Vietnam Fatherland Front has performed its tasks of giving opinions and social criticism, along with monitoring and approving the Front’s activities. It gives comments on over 30 legal documents every year.”

Protecting legitimate rights and benefits of people

According to Politburo member and standing member of the Party Central Committee Secretariat Tran Quoc Vuong, the Vietnam Fatherland Front should continually reform, especially in its mode of operation, to consolidate its position in the country’s political system. He says the Front needs to exert efforts to fulfill its role as a medium agency connecting political and social organisations as well as outstanding individuals.

The Fatherland Front must perform its role of protecting people’s legitimate rights and benefits; making use of potentials from the great unity bloc; implementing democracy, improving social consensus; promoting people’s patriotism; etc. to safeguard the nation in the new situation, Vuong stresses.

“A proud 90-year history of the Vietnam Fatherland Front is an endless flow of patriotism and national unity tradition. Under the Party’s leadership, our people have united within the Fatherland Front, created great miracles that increase the nation’s prestige,” President of the Vietnam Fatherland Front Tran Thanh Man says./.

Politburo member and Secretary of the Hanoi Municipal Party Committee Vuong Dinh Hue made the requirement during a working session with the city’s urban district on March 1.

Delegates at the meeting discussed implementation results of political tasks in the district last year, as well as proposing direction for key task realisation in 2021 and during 2021-2025.

Addressing the session, Hue requested that the district should continue to update new points and major policies set at the 13th National Party Congress and the 17th Hanoi Party Congress, thereby reviewing and completing the district’s working agenda.

Efforts should be paid on doing well the Party building work to turn Dong Da District Party Committee into an exemplary and leading Party cell in the capital city, the senior Hanoi leader stated.

He also emphasised that the district must perform well the “dual goals” in the fight against COVID-19 and boosting local socio-economic development, with a focus on developing industries with high economic value and building support policies to assist business development and nurture budget collection.

Referring to planning management, Hue urged the district to awake its land potential that has not been fully exploited, in addition to consider the use of underground and overhead space to develop Dong Da into a green, smart and modern district of the capital city.

Members of the Hanoi Party Committee make donations to the “Fund for Vietnam’s Sea and Islands” 2021, Hanoi, March 1, 2021. (Photo: NDO/Duy Linh)

That afternoon, Hue joined the city’s leaders in making donation to support the “Fund for Vietnam’s Sea and Islands” at an event organised by the Hanoi Party Committee.

With a sense of responsibility and affection towards the nation’s sacred sea and islands, each official, public servant and employee of Hanoi public agencies support at least their one day’s salary to the fund.

The organisers collected nearly VND150 million at the event.