Lang Son: Promoting the conservation and promotion of cultural values ​​and natural landscapes, creating livelihoods for ethnic minorities to escape poverty

From the capital source of the National Target Program for Socio-Economic Development in Ethnic Minority and Mountainous Areas, Lang Son province has made efforts to transform policies into projects on cultivation and livestock breeding associated with value chains and sustainable tourism exploitation, thereby creating livelihoods and improving the lives of ethnic minorities in the province.

Lang Son province is a mountainous border province with complex terrain, mainly low mountains and hills, the population is ethnic minorities, especially in mountainous communes, accounting for a large proportion. Ethnic minorities in the province are mainly Nung, Tay, Dao, Hoa, San Chay, Mong.

The implementation of the National Target Program (NTP) for socio -economic development in ethnic minority and mountainous areas (EM) deployed under Decision No. 1719/QD-TTg dated October 14, 2021 of the Prime Minister has received attention, leadership and direction from all levels and sectors. In particular, many projects and activities focusing on promoting production capacity, connecting markets and ensuring access to resources are the key keys to creating sustainable livelihoods for EM people instead of just providing assistance. Thanks to the appropriate allocation of development investment capital and career capital, not only infrastructure is invested in and developed, but production is also promoted and local livelihoods are supported.

Capital from the National Target Program for Socio-Economic Development in Ethnic Minority Areas contributes to promoting production and supporting livelihoods in Lang Son.

Typical support activities of Lang Son in recent times have focused on supporting agricultural and forestry production in chains, implementing cooperative linkage models, vocational training linked to market demand and supporting policy access. Some livelihood models include: Converting crops to varieties with high economic value, cooperating with purchasing enterprises to reduce output risks; developing production forests combined with natural forest conservation, creating sustainable income from combined agriculture and forestry; supporting the formation of cooperatives and cooperative groups to increase input purchasing power, enhance processing value and market access.

Up to now, Lang Son province has completed a number of important contents of the National Target Program on Socio-Economic Development of Ethnic Minority Areas (Program) such as: issuing guidance mechanisms, organizing the implementation of sub-projects to support the development of combined agricultural and forestry production, vocational training for the community, and allocating capital for agricultural and forestry projects. According to the Department of Ethnic Minorities and Religions of Lang Son province, in the first half of 2025, the Program continued to be promoted, a number of projects had good progress in implementation and disbursement, especially investment projects. Notably, Project 3 of the Program on sustainable agricultural and forestry production development helps promote the potential and strengths of regions to produce goods according to the value chain. Sub-project 1 of Project 3 is in the process of implementing a project to support forest protection contracts for special-use forests and protective forests; Support for forest protection, planned protection forests and production forests, which are natural forests assigned to communities and households; support for zoning and regeneration with additional planted forests; support for planting production forests, economic exploitation under forest canopy and development of non-timber forest products.

In the period of 2021-2025, on average, each year in Lang Son province, there are over 9,000 hectares of newly planted forests, an average of 3 million scattered trees are planted each year, the targets of forest regeneration, forest care, and forest protection have all completed the assigned plan. At the same time, policies to support interest rates on loans for planting forestry trees, medicinal plants and fruit trees, and specific policies to encourage investment in agriculture and rural areas have really entered the lives of ethnic minorities, serving as a lever to promote economic development. There have been 23 projects to develop production according to the value chain, 16 projects to support community production development have been implemented to promote business development, start-ups and attract investment in ethnic minorities.

In addition, Lang Son province also promotes the preservation and promotion of cultural values, natural landscapes, traditional customs, local specialties, creating strengths to attract tourism to develop the economy and create more economic for ethnic minorities. The province has completed the geological work dossier of Lang Son Geopark to apply for UNESCO recognition to open more opportunities to develop community tourism, create jobs, increase income for many highland communes, thereby supplementing traditional agricultural and forestry livelihoods.

In the process of organizing and implementing the National Target Program on Socio-Economic Development in Ethnic Minority and Mountainous Areas, a number of difficulties and problems have arisen, affecting the disbursement progress and implementation results. This requires solutions so that programs and projects are not only implemented in a progressive manner and stopped according to deadlines, but also bring long-term effectiveness in developing and maintaining sustainable livelihoods for ethnic minorities in the future. Some priority solutions include: promoting the completion of land allocation procedures, stabilizing production land; enhancing disbursement and monitoring capital efficiency; developing value chains and market linkages; diversifying livelihoods through sustainable tourism and non-agricultural industries; at the same time, expanding access to policy credit in accordance with the production cycle for ethnic minorities, especially ethnic minorities who are poor households.

Thanks to the support capital of the Program, ethnic minorities in Lang Son are more confident in economic development activities.

With the potential and advantages of natural resources, geological heritage and ethnic culture, capital from the National Target Program for Socio-Economic Development of Ethnic Minority Areas has created an important foundation for ethnic minorities in Lang Son province to strive to escape poverty and improve their lives.

However, to move from “support” to “sustainable livelihoods”, closer coordination between land policies, rapid and targeted capital allocation, local capacity building and market connectivity is needed. Once these bottlenecks are resolved, livelihood models in Lang Son can become a testament to the path of sustainable development for ethnic minority areas.

Source: https://bvhttdl.gov.vn/lang-son-day-manh-bao-ton-phat-huy-gia-tri-van-hoa-canh-quan-thien-nhien-tao-sinh-ke-cho-dong-bao-dan-toc-thieu-so-thoat-ngheo-20251108222743604.htm