Preserving and promoting cultural values in building new rural areas in Dien Bien province

With the consistent viewpoint in the process of implementing New Rural Construction, it is not only a process of creating changes in architecture, landscape, infrastructure but also a change in lifestyle, thinking and cultural practices of the people, meeting the requirements of a developing society. In recent times , Dien Bien province has paid attention and invested in many practical activities, contributing to changing the appearance of the countryside and improving the quality of people's spiritual life, while preserving and conserving the national cultural identity, creating a close relationship with the community in residential areas in the area. New Rural Construction is not only a process of creating changes in architecture, landscape, infrastructure but also a change in lifestyle, thinking and cultural practices of the people, meeting the requirements of a developing society.

Dien Bien is a mountainous border province, bordering the Lao PDR and the People's Republic of China. The province has 08 districts, 01 town, 01 city with 129 communes, wards and towns; with a population of over 600,000 people (according to the Resolution of the Provincial People's Council following the 2-level local government model, the province has 3 wards and 42 communes) ; including 19 ethnic groups living together, it is a convergence of many ethnic minorities with unique traditional cultural values. The cultural and artistic treasures of ethnic groups left over from generations have affirmed that Dien Bien has a very early developed culture, unique, rich and diverse. With 19 ethnic groups living together, some of which account for a high proportion in the population structure such as Mong, Thai, Kinh... the ethnic groups in Dien Bien province basically preserve their traditional culture, social customs and beliefs, traditional crafts, traditional festivals, folk performing arts, folk knowledge... creating a colorful cultural picture. Preserving and promoting cultural values not only contributes to enriching Vietnamese cultural identity but also creates a driving force for sustainable socio -economic development in the locality.

Implementing the National Target Program on new rural construction, in addition to economic development, infrastructure construction, and improving people's material life, Dien Bien also focuses on preserving and promoting cultural values. Preserving and developing cultural values associated with new rural construction is both a goal and a task of special strategic significance because culture is a solid spiritual foundation of society, an endogenous strength that ensures comprehensive development. Preserving and developing culture is to preserve traditional cultural identity, and at the same time create new values for the countryside, which is a modern countryside with economic, cultural and social values. Accordingly, in recent years, the work of preserving, conserving and promoting the cultural values of ethnic groups in Dien Bien province has always been of interest and focus. This is demonstrated through Resolutions, programs, and Projects, typically: Resolution No. 11-NQ/TU dated July 29, 2021 of the Provincial Party Committee on preserving and developing the culture of ethnic groups in Dien Bien province associated with socio-economic development in the 2021-2025 period, with a vision to 2030; Resolution No. 05/2023/NQ-HDND dated July 14, 2023 of the Provincial People's Council stipulating the level of funding to support activities for mass art troupes in Dien Bien province; Resolution No. 03-NQ/TU of the Provincial Party Committee on developing tourism in Dien Bien province until 2025, with a vision to 2030; Project on preserving and developing the culture of ethnic groups in Dien Bien province associated with socio-economic development in the 2021-2025 period, with a vision to 2030; Project on preserving, embellishing and promoting the value of the special national historical relic of Dien Bien Phu Battlefield until 2030; Project on developing tourism in Dien Bien province until 2025, with a vision to 2030...; many programs and projects related to preserving, conserving and promoting the cultural values of ethnic groups in the province have been and are being implemented, initially achieving very encouraging results.

Currently, in the province, there are 35 relics ranked by competent authorities (including 01 special national historical relic with 46 component relics; 14 national relics, 20 provincial relics); 22 intangible cultural heritages of ethnic groups are included in the list of national intangible cultural heritages, 02 intangible cultural heritages are listed by UNESCO in the List of Representative Intangible Cultural Heritages of Humanity; 41 artisans have been awarded the title of "Excellent Artisan" by the President in the field of intangible cultural heritage; 18/19 ethnic groups have been inventoried and evaluated for cultural heritage; 02 traditional ethnic cultural villages have been preserved ( Thai ethnic village, Che Can village , Muong Phang commune) . and the Khmu ethnic group in Keo village, Pa Khoang commune, Dien Bien Phu city) . Many provincial-level scientific research topics on preserving and promoting the cultural heritage values of ethnic groups have been and are being implemented... Some typical festivals are maintained and organized annually such as: Hoa Ban Festival (Dien Bien Phu city), Hoang Cong Chat Temple Festival (Dien Bien district), Swallow-tailed Boat Racing Festival (Muong Lay town), Spring Festival (Dien Bien Dong district),... with many exchange activities, cultural and artistic activities have gradually become typical tourism products of the province, attracting a large number of people, domestic and foreign tourists to participate, respond, contributing to the growth of tourism in the province.

The Martyrs' Temple at Dien Bien Phu Battlefield was built on Hill F, one of the component relics of Dien Bien Phu Battlefield Relics.

Festivals of some ethnic minorities are being restored and preserved, typically: Water Festival (Bun Huot Nam) of the Lao ethnic group; Village Worshiping Festival (Te hroi cung) of the Kho Mu ethnic group; Harvest Praying Festival of the Si La ethnic group; Fire Jumping Festival of the Dao ethnic group; Harvest Praying Festival of the Kho Mu ethnic group; Village Worshiping Festival (Ga ma thu) of the Ha Nhi ethnic group... Many backward customs are being gradually eliminated, rituals and ceremonies are shortened to ensure solemnity, politeness, and suitability to the reality of social life and customs of each ethnic group. Implementing the preservation of cultural heritage of ethnic groups with a population of less than 10,000 people out of the need for urgent protection of cultural heritage (Dien Bien province has 02 ethnic groups, Si La and Cong). Festivals are organized economically, in accordance with economic conditions, customs and traditions of the ethnic groups.

Water splashing festival of Lao people in Nua Ngam commune is recognized as national intangible cultural heritage.

In addition, in recent years, in the process of implementing 19 criteria for new rural construction in general and 2 criteria on culture in particular, Dien Bien province has implemented many activities to preserve and promote cultural values in the process of building new rural areas. Investment in building facilities and technical infrastructure for cultural, physical training and sports activities has been promoted in recent years. The province's system of cultural and sports institutions has been invested in, built, and created on-site cultural activities for people; cultural life in rural, mountainous and border areas has gradually improved. By the end of 2024, the whole province will have 897/1,446 villages, hamlets and residential groups with cultural houses and community activity points; 10/10 districts and towns have district-level cultural and sports houses; 104/129 communes, wards and towns have cultural and sports houses; 80/1,446 villages and hamlets have football fields; the whole province has 06 stadiums, more than 1,400 sports fields, 134 training houses, 23 swimming pools and over 230 other sports areas. In general, the system of cultural and sports institutions at the grassroots level in the province has been promoting its functions, contributing to promoting the cultural, artistic, physical education and sports movements, serving well the political tasks of the locality, meeting the living needs and improving the cultural and spiritual life of the people, creating a healthy cultural environment for the socio-economic development of the province in the new situation.

Many community cultural exchange activities are regularly organized; district and commune levels regularly organize festivals, competitions, cultural performances, traditional arts and sports of inter-commune and inter-village ethnic groups; send delegations of artisans from ethnic minorities such as Thai, Mong, Kho Mu, Lao, Cong... to participate in cultural activities and events at the Vietnam Ethnic Culture and Tourism Village, Thai Cultural Festival, Mong Cultural Festival, Northwest Ethnic Cultural Festival, Vietnam - Laos Cultural Festival... Dien Bien province also hosts many national and regional competitions and sports competitions of ethnic groups, through which ethnic people can exchange, learn, enhance understanding and strengthen solidarity; many good traditional cultural values of ethnic groups are aroused, preserved and promoted in life.

The work of educating local cultural and historical traditions has been focused on by all levels, sectors and localities. Up to now, most of the general schools in the province have included local cultural and historical content in the curriculum, typically the organization of experiential and learning programs at museums and relics has contributed to educating the young generation of the province about local cultural and historical traditions.

Cultural and artistic activities are regularly organized from the province to the grassroots, attracting a large number of people to participate, creating a useful and healthy playground, contributing to the orientation of correct tastes and aesthetics, to comprehensively develop personality, towards the perfection of each individual and society. The art education program is integrated into school teaching, creating conditions for students to develop their talents and strengths while improving their understanding and appreciation of art. Localities perform well in various forms of mass art; annually, nearly 3,500 mass art performances and many festivals, competitions, and performances are organized, meeting the needs of enjoyment and cultural activities of all classes of people.

Professional performing arts activities in Dien Bien province are increasingly improved in quality, meeting the increasing enjoyment needs of the people. Every year, many performing arts programs are built to serve political tasks (celebrating major holidays of the country, the province, Tet holidays, cultural, sports and tourism events of the province...). In addition, performing arts programs are built to serve people in mountainous, remote and border areas, contributing to improving the cultural and spiritual life of the people. Art programs with a harmonious combination of traditional and contemporary arts, demonstrating creativity and originality; many new musical works praising the land, people and cultural beauty of ethnic groups in the province are composed and performed, contributing to preserving and promoting the fine traditional artistic values of ethnic groups, while at the same time demonstrating the selective absorption of the cultural quintessence of humanity.

Mass cultural and artistic activities take place enthusiastically, attracting a large number of people to participate, creating a useful and healthy playground, meeting the needs of people for cultural enjoyment and activities, this is also an opportunity to discover and nurture artistic talents. Up to now, the whole province has 1,261 mass art teams operating regularly. Training courses on cultural and artistic skills, activities to organize and guide the grassroots, staging folk songs, folk dances, traditional music for the younger generations, art teams of cultural villages, and clubs are regularly organized.

Cultural Center, Cinema, propaganda, performing arts serving the grassroots

On May 7, 2021, the Executive Committee of the Dien Bien Provincial Party Committee issued Resolution No. 03-NQ/TU on tourism development in Dien Bien province to 2025, with a vision to 2030, identifying development goals for the province's tourism industry. It emphasized that tourism in Dien Bien province needs to create a breakthrough and develop comprehensively in terms of scope, scale, and nature to develop tourism into a spearhead economic sector, creating momentum for growth and economic restructuring. Focus on developing tourism products: Historical and spiritual tourism; Cultural and ecological tourism; Resort, entertainment, and health care tourism. Focus on developing diverse tourism products to build Dien Bien into an attractive tourist destination in the Northern midland and mountainous region by 2025, on the basis of effectively exploiting potentials and advantages associated with preserving and maintaining national cultural identity, historical relics, protecting and improving the ecological environment, improving the material and spiritual life of the people, maintaining political security, social order and safety and national border sovereignty. Accordingly, tourism products with ethnic cultural identity are always interested in and focused on development based on the advantages of cultural resources of ethnic groups in Dien Bien. The province has focused on exploiting tourism products associated with the cultural identity of ethnic groups in the area; bringing unique experiences to tourists. Tangible and intangible cultural resources are always preserved and promoted such as: Ban Phu Citadel relic, Sam Mun Citadel (Dien Bien district), Muong Luan tower, Chieng So tower (Dien Bien Dong district), ... festivals such as: Hoa Ban festival, Swallow-tailed boat racing festival (Muong Lay town), Ban Phu Citadel festival (Dien Bien district), Xuan Phin Ho festival (Nam Po district), Xen Muong Thanh festival (Dien Bien district, Dien Bien Phu city), ... have been and are creating unique cultural tourism products for tourism in Dien Bien province. In general, cultural tourism products exploiting ethnic cultural values in Dien Bien have been and are being developed relatively well, however, the cultural tourism potential of the province is very large, it is necessary to pay attention to developing diverse ethnic cultural experience activities in the coming time. In addition, a pilot model of developing OCOP tourism products, under the One Commune One Product Program for the period 2021-2025 (phase 1) has been implemented in Na Su village, Cha Nua commune, Nam Po district.

Dien Bien successfully organized the Northwest Tourism Fair in 2024 within the framework of the National Tourism Year - Dien Bien

In addition to completing cultural facilities and cultural institutions, the movement to build the title of "Cultural Family" and "Cultural Residential Area" in the province has recently had many positive changes in both awareness and action, deeply affecting the thoughts and consciousness of each family and community. By the end of 2024, 104,770/139,134 households in the province achieved the title of "Cultural Family", accounting for 75.3%; 870/1,446 villages, hamlets and residential groups in the province achieved the title of "Cultural Village, Hamlet and Residential Group", accounting for 60.2%; 897/1,446 villages, hamlets and residential groups have cultural houses; 13/14 wards and towns meet urban civilization standards, accounting for 92.9%.

From 2021 to present, the Department of Culture, Sports and Tourism has organized 29 training courses to improve the capacity of organizing grassroots cultural and artistic activities, implementing the National Target Program on New Rural Development, attracting the participation of more than 1,100 students in 28 communes to create conditions for students to access, exchange, learn experiences, grasp methods and skills to organize cultural and artistic activities to build a cultural and artistic movement at the grassroots level, expand community tourism activities, develop village and hamlet art teams in many forms, and at the same time introduce a number of unique folk games of ethnic groups in the province, contributing to improving the level of cultural and sports enjoyment of all classes of people, meeting the needs of entertainment for people in new rural construction. Building a civilized lifestyle, maintaining, preserving and promoting the cultural identity of ethnic groups in an advanced direction, eliminating backward customs and practices that hinder the development of the social community, building a civilized lifestyle in the ethnic communities in rural areas of the province is always considered important. Promoting the movement "All people unite to build a cultural life" to raise awareness, sense of compliance with laws and cultural regulations of rural people; building, consolidating and developing the system of cultural and sports institutions at the grassroots level, creating conditions for rural people to improve their enjoyment, participation in cultural activities and creativity; improving the quality of the movement to build "Cultural families", "Cultural villages, hamlets and residential groups", implementing the criteria for developing new rural culture at the commune level; Building people, families, rural communities and a healthy, rich rural cultural environment, rich in national cultural identity, creating a driving force to promote social development in rural areas.

Training course to improve capacity to build cultural life according to the new rural program is held annually.

The consistent goal of the new rural construction program is to improve the material and spiritual life of the people. Therefore, in addition to socio-economic development, preserving and developing cultural values, it is necessary to inspire and foster good cultural values in each person, each family and in each village, hamlet and residential area so that culture truly becomes the spiritual foundation of society, ensuring the goal of building a modern new rural area, while still preserving the traditional cultural features of the countryside, aiming at building a sustainable and effective new rural area. Thus, it can be seen that preserving and promoting national cultural values plays an important role in building a new rural area, contributing to creating the identity of the rural area, improving the spiritual life of the people and building a cultural lifestyle in the villages and hamlets. This is not only a criterion in building a new rural area but also a driving force for socio-economic development.

In addition to the achievements, the work of preserving and promoting cultural values in the construction of new rural areas in Dien Bien province still faces many challenges: Investment funds for cultural work are limited, not meeting actual needs. A part of the population is not fully aware of the importance of culture, leading to the preservation and promotion of culture not receiving due attention. The process of integration and urbanization can cause traditional cultural values to fade away, especially among young people. Facilities serving cultural activities in some areas are still lacking, not meeting the requirements.

In order for culture to truly become the spiritual foundation of society, while ensuring the goal of building a modern new countryside, while still preserving the traditional cultural features of the countryside, aiming to build a new countryside that is substantial, effective, and sustainable, closely linked to preserving and promoting good cultural values that contribute to improving the spiritual life of the people, we would like to propose the following solutions and recommendations:

One is: Continue to perfect policies suitable to the cultural characteristics of local ethnic groups, increase resources for preserving the cultural identity of ethnic minorities in the process of building new rural areas, especially perfecting the system of grassroots cultural institutions.

Second, strengthen propaganda activities to raise awareness of authorities at all levels and ethnic minorities about economic development along with the issue of preserving and promoting good local customs and practices. Promote propaganda and education on culture, creating consensus in the whole society about the importance of preserving and promoting culture.

Third, promote the conservation and promotion of tangible and intangible cultural values; survey, investigation and collection of cultural values of community activities, festivals, folk cultural forms such as folk songs, folk dances, traditional costumes, patterns, and ethnic musical instruments; Fourth, evaluate objective and subjective factors and potential negative impacts of urbanization and resettlement on ethnic minorities. Build cultural life and cultural environment in ethnic minority areas, closely linking activities to build cultural life with socio-economic development tasks appropriate to each locality and each ethnic group.

Fifth, Build unique and attractive cultural tourism products, create income for people and promote the image of Dien Bien. Preserve and promote cultural heritage associated with tourism development. Use information technology to digitize cultural heritage, promote culture on the internet, and create digital cultural products.

Sixth, Build a team of cultural cadres to meet the requirements of work in the new situation; have policies and mechanisms to promote prestigious people, artisans, and the younger generation in preserving and promoting traditional culture and prioritize training cadres who are children of ethnic minorities to work in culture. Prioritize the allocation of resources for the work of preserving and promoting cultural values, especially projects to preserve heritage, support artisans, and develop community culture. Encourage people to participate in the work of preserving and promoting culture, support clubs, art troupes, and social organizations operating in the cultural field.

Seventh, Synchronously build and improve the quality and efficiency of community cultural institutions, truly promote the role of the community in organizing cultural activities. Actively promote the socialization of cultural and sports activities, especially the construction of cultural institutions at the grassroots level. Mobilize all classes of people, all levels, all sectors, all social organizations to participate in building and developing cultural and sports activities...

Eight, Strengthen coordination between departments, branches, sectors, and relevant organizations in the work of preserving and promoting culture.

Preserving and promoting cultural values is a long-term task and requires the cooperation of the whole community. With the above solutions and recommendations, I believe that Dien Bien province will achieve more success in this work, contributing to building a new countryside that is rich, civilized and imbued with national cultural identity.

Although the results achieved are still modest compared to many provinces and cities across the country, for a mountainous province with special difficulties, there are still many challenges in the process of implementing and realizing the goals of the National Target Program for New Rural Areas. However, with the determination and participation of the entire political system, the province does not put too much emphasis on completing specific annual targets in evaluating the results of the National Target Program for New Rural Areas, so it does not create pressure for localities to "run" after achievements, because building cultural criteria in new rural areas on the basis of synchronously completing cultural infrastructure, preserving and promoting traditional cultural values not only changes the face of the countryside but also improves the spiritual life of the people, creates a healthy cultural environment to multiply traditional cultural values, contributing to the successful implementation of Resolution No. 33-NQ/TW of the Party Central Committee on "Building and developing Vietnamese culture and people to meet the requirements of sustainable national development"./.

Source: https://svhttdl.dienbien.gov.vn/portal/pages/2025-08-18/Bao-ton-va-phat-huy-gia-tri-Culture-trong-xay-dung.aspx