Efforts to reduce poverty in border communes

A corner of Muong Leo commune center today.

With a natural area of over 37,000 hectares, the unused land area in Muong Leo commune is still very large, about over 15,000 hectares. People mainly produce for self-sufficiency, crop and livestock productivity is low, the poverty rate is high, over 43%.

To escape poverty, the commune has stepped up propaganda and mobilized people to raise awareness and consciousness to rise up, not to wait or rely on the State. Mr. Luong Van Thi, Chairman of the People's Committee of Muong Leo commune, said: Based on the actual situation, the commune has developed plans to support poor and near-poor households to escape poverty sustainably and assigned specific targets to the villages; directed organizations to increase support for poor households to build suitable models of cultivation and livestock breeding, improve access to information and apply technical advances in production.

Concrete the road from the center of Muong Leo commune to Huoi Luong village.

To concretize the support for people to develop production, the commune regularly coordinates with the Agricultural Technical Station of Region XI to open training courses for farmers on livestock raising techniques, planting and caring for fruit trees, grafting, and improving mixed gardens. Mobilizing people to continue intensive farming on 17 hectares of spring rice, 100 hectares of summer rice, 503 hectares of upland rice, 55 hectares of corn, and 148 hectares of cassava. Along with that, people focus on converting upland and sloping land from growing ineffective food crops to growing 142 hectares of orange, hawthorn, and mango trees.

The commune has proposed solutions to promote livestock development in the direction of commodity production, focusing on replicating effective models of raising buffaloes and cows in cages, continuing to create and restore herds. Taking advantage of large grasslands and grazing areas, focusing on developing livestock in the direction of commodities and semi-grazing. Currently, all villages of Muong Leo have their own grazing areas, the total large livestock herd in the commune reaches over 5,000 buffaloes and cows; the pig herd is nearly 2,100.

Farmers in Lieng village, Muong Leo commune, grow fruit trees.

Creating capital conditions to support people in developing production, the commune's associations and unions also guaranteed with the Social Policy Bank for 584 poor households to borrow over 27.2 billion VND in preferential capital to build effective production and livestock models. Mr. Lo Van Khien, Secretary and Head of Lieng village, Muong Leo commune, said: Thanks to the credit capital of the Social Policy Bank, many poor and near-poor households in the village have had capital to expand the area of growing orange and tangerine trees, raising buffalo and cows in barns, bringing in high income, having a comfortable and prosperous life. The village has 82 households, of which 35 households are borrowing more than 1.7 billion VND in credit from the Social Policy Bank to develop the family economy . In 2024, 3 households have escaped poverty.

In addition, Muong Leo also focuses on protecting 8,100 hectares of protective forests and planting over 9,700 hectares of production forests. Each village has established a forest protection and fire prevention team, responsible for patrolling, protecting, propagating and guiding people to produce crops on the fields according to regulations. Up to now, the forest coverage rate of the commune has reached nearly 50%. Every year, forest owners are paid 2.5-3 billion VND for forest environmental services, which has helped the villages have more resources to invest in infrastructure and build new rural areas.

People of Mat village, Muong Leo commune, develop large livestock farming.

With the determination to promote internal resources and effectively integrate project programs and support policies of the State, from 2023 to now, Muong Leo commune has concretized 1.5 km of inter-village roads, currently the whole commune has over 17 km of concrete roads. Electricity, roads, schools and stations continue to receive attention and investment; 10/13 villages have cultural houses; 98% of households have access to the national grid; 85% of people have access to clean water. The commune is investing in repairing and upgrading roads to Cham Hy village, the internal road of Mat village and the inter-village road of Lieng - Nam Pun. Once completed, it will help people travel and transport agricultural products conveniently.

The synchronous and effective implementation of poverty reduction solutions in Muong Leo has helped people's lives to continuously improve, hunger and poverty to be gradually pushed back; political security and social order to be stable, and border security to be maintained.

Source: https://baosonla.vn/xa-hoi/no-luc-giam-ngheo-o-xa-bien-gioi-lgPBXGgDg.html