In the past, when Ky Anh was mentioned, generally people thought of a poor district in the southern part of central Ha Tinh province. At one stage, 80,000 people left the district to seek jobs, accounting for one-third of its population and local authorities had to provide cassava for local people as famine relief. At the time, Ky Anh’s economy was self-sufficient and mainly relied on rice cultivation while the area’s soil was salty. Therefore, 70 percent of its population often faced a shortage of food.

Actively overcoming poverty

Despite a number of difficulties, many communes in Ky Anh District have successfully implemented the poverty reduction programme, thanks to the great efforts of local people. Recently, the number of poor households in Ky Anh fell to 10.3 percent and the annual average income is VND4.2 million. This number is not high but local living standards have been improved significantly.

How to eliminate poverty to lift Ky Anh out of the list of poor districts and develop it into an industrial district is a key concern of the district Party Committee.

Deputy Secretary of the district Party Committee Ha Van Trung said, “Poverty reduction and improving local living standards is a demanding task but we are determined to continue the work. We have paid great attention to launching small projects to help poor families develop production instead of just providing them food relief.”

The Ky Anh Party Committee has worked with all its might to change the local economic patterns by focussing on all three economic areas: coastal area, aquaculture; delta area, agriculture, and trade and services; while the mountain area, forestry and processed agriculture and forestry products.

Mr Trung said vast forests in the west of Ky Thuong, Ky Lam and Ky Lac districts are now covered with green trees, and farmers know how to exploit the forestry economy with average annual incomes of around VND30-40 million per hectare. In the coastal area, local people engage in aquaculture combined with poultry and cattle raising, earning average incomes of VND60-80 million per hectare per year. Many people in the communes of Ky Tho, Ky Hai and Ky Hung faced food shortages in the past but now many households have become well off. General speaking, the local people’s living standards have much improved. These achievements are attributed to the great efforts of Party Committee, local authorities and people.

Developing Ky Anh into an industrial centre

In addition to aquaculture and forestry development, the Ky Anh Party Committee has implemented industrial, construction, service and tourism development policies. While the industrial, service and tourism value was zero in the past, it now accounts for more than half of the district’s GDP.

New thinking by the Party Committee and the area’s advantages such as the Vung Anh deep water port, Vung Anh industrial zone, Highway No12 linking Vung Anh with Laos, Thach Khe Mine, southern Ha Tinh urban area, and thermoelectric plant No1 with a capacity of 1,120MW, will help Ky Anh achieve the target of poverty elimination, which was set at the 18^th District’s Party Congress for the 2005-2010 period to become a service and industrial centre of southern Ha Tinh.

Mr Trung added that the district aims to achieve a GDP growth rate of 13-15 percent in 2006 and triple the figure by 2010. To fulfill the target, the district will mobilise all local people’s strength and fully exploit its advantages to create favourable conditions, especially in terms of land acquisition for investors, in order to develop the district into a service and industrial centre, Mr Trung said.