Rural urban migration effects on rural areas

Villagers were upset at a decision of the district authorities that revoked their farming land and leased it out to a company for some craft village project. The district authorities decided that every family will be compensated VND240 million ($10,350) for every 1,100 square meters (1,300 square yards) of land they had to give up for the project, or get 10 percent of the land’s total area elsewhere. … [Read more...] about On fertile agricultural land, Vietnam’s shooting itself in the foot

Besides the Phu My Hung flower festival, one of the most anticipated events of the holiday season is the annual Nguyen Hue flower street, which will open to visitors from 7 p.m. on January 22, two days before the Lunar New Year’s Eve. It will remain open until January 28. … [Read more...] about Spring flower fest heralds Tet festivies in Saigon expat-favored district

Tra Vinh (VNS/VNA) - Farmers in the Mekong Delta province of Tra Vinh are entering the mud crab harvest for Tet (Lunar New Year) and earning a high profit of 30 - 35 million VND (1,300 - 1,500 USD) per hectare as demand is high for the coming holiday, which falls on January 25. In the province, farmers harvest three mud crab crops a year, including one for Tet, as it takes about four months from breeding until harvest.   Farmers in the province, which is one of the delta’s largest mud crab producers, breed mud crabs mostly in the coastal areas of Cau Ngang, Duyen Hai and Chau Thanh districts and Duyen Hai town. Nguyen Van Hue, who breeds mud crabs in Chau Thanh’s Long Hoa commune, said most mud crab farmers earned high profits last year because of high prices. Mud crabs are purchased by traders at prices between 150,000-320,000 VND (6.5-14 USD) a kilo depending on their gender and size. The province’s mud crabs are sold locally and other localities, … [Read more...] about Tra Vinh farmers harvest mud crab for Tet, earn high profit

“The pressure that might depreciate the dong in Q1 and the first half of Q2 was quite high,” said Le Quang Trung, deputy general director and head of the treasury and capital division at VIB Bank. However, he said, things changed in Q2 and Q3. Instead of lifting interest rates the Fed did the opposite, bringing them down to promote economic growth, and thus the flow of foreign direct investment (FDI) returned to Vietnam, a country said to benefit from the trade war between the U.S. and China. … [Read more...] about Peacetime in sight for the dong

Chickens at a henhouse near Loon-Plage. (Photo: AFP/Philippe Huguen) Czech official Petr Vorlicek said "the highly pathogenic H5N8 subtype lethal for birds" was found at a small farm 150km southeast of the capital Prague. … [Read more...] about Czechs detect bird flu as new Europe outbreak feared