Severe natural disasters require suitable storm and flood-prevention housing models

Photo caption — Chief of Office, Spokesperson of the Ministry of Construction Nguyen Tri Duc answers reporters' questions - Photo: VGP

In addition, Mr. Nguyen Tri Duc also answered questions about proposals to build infrastructure projects for the Central region to cope with increasingly severe and unusual natural disasters like today.

Review the terrain characteristics of each region for application.

According to the Spokesperson of the Ministry of Construction Nguyen Tri Duc, in 2014, the Prime Minister issued Decision No. 48/2014/QD-TTg on policies to support poor households in building houses to prevent storms and floods in the Central region. The scope of application is in 13 provinces and cities in the North Central region and the Central Coast.

Then, on October 23, 2014, the Ministry of Construction issued Circular 16/2014/TT-BXD, in which the Ministry required localities to study and design at least 3 typical storm and flood-proof housing models for people to refer to, without requiring households to build according to the model design.

“In addition to the sample design, localities have had specific instructions for cases of renovation and raising floors to make houses to prevent storms and floods. In accordance with the regulations, localities have designed and published at least 3 models, some localities have up to 6-8 models (Hue, Thanh Hoa ). These housing models are all posted on the local Department of Construction's Information Portal,” said Mr. Nguyen Tri Duc.

At the same time, the Ministry of Construction is researching and implementing a system of safe housing designs for natural disaster prevention and control in the period 2007 - 2023 and is published on the National Institute of Architecture's Information Portal, including 176 models that can be used immediately for localities, including models: Typical houses in natural disaster areas (Central and Southwestern regions); houses resistant to storms, flash floods, landslides; rural houses by region; houses adapting to climate change and rising sea levels.

According to the Ministry of Construction, many localities have put these designs into use as the main reference documents, serving as guidance for design, housing renovation and building programs to support housing to prevent storms and floods (Dak Lak, Ha Tinh, Quang Tri, Phu Yen before the merger).

In addition, for 6 localities (before the merger) including: Thanh Hoa, Quang Binh, Thua Thien Hue, Quang Nam, Quang Ngai, Ca Mau participating in Project Component 1 - Support for building storm and flood resistant houses under the Project "Enhancing resilience to the impacts of climate change for vulnerable coastal communities in Vietnam" funded by the Green Climate Fund GCF through the United Nations Development Program UNDP, the funding is integrated to add storm resistance features for poor households eligible for support under Decision No. 48/2014/QD-TTg dated August 28, 2014 of the Prime Minister.

Construction Ministry spokesman Nguyen Tri Duc said that, through implementation, houses following the above mentioned sample designs are safe and resistant to storms and floods. However, in recent years, storms and floods have occurred in most localities across the country with much more complexity and danger, so there is a need for new storm and flood-prevention house designs that are suitable for the actual situation.

“The Ministry of Construction requests the People's Committees of the provinces to direct the Departments of Construction and relevant agencies to coordinate with the National Institute of Architecture (Ministry of Construction) to review the terrain characteristics of each region to apply and select the design model according to the instructions in Official Dispatch 234/CD-TTg dated November 30, 2025 of the Prime Minister. The implementation needs to be closely linked with construction planning, rural planning, regional planning, ensuring long-term safety, not just immediate handling,” the Spokesperson of the Ministry of Construction proposed.

Quickly mobilize materials such as cement, steel... for construction

To ensure construction progress as required by the Government, the Ministry of Construction will prioritize mobilizing materials such as cement, steel and labor from agencies, organizations, businesses, localities and the entire political system, ensuring that all people have housing and enjoy the Lunar New Year.

According to Mr. Nguyen Tri Duc, regarding planning, based on the National master plan, in 2021, the Ministry of Transport (now the Ministry of Construction) organized the synchronous establishment of national sector planning for 5 transport sectors (road; maritime, inland waterway; railway; aviation) to ensure maintaining the advantages of each mode of transport in maximizing the exploitation efficiency of the entire transport system of the whole country.

“The climate change and sea level rise scenarios of the Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment (now the Ministry of Agriculture and Environment) at that time were updated in the Planning,” said a representative of the Ministry of Construction.

According to the 5 approved plans, the Central and Central Highlands regions are planned: For roads, 11 expressways with a length of nearly 1,500 km, 24 main national highways with a length of over 4,400 km to help connect important economic corridors; for aviation, the Central and Central Highlands regions are planned with 14 airports; for maritime, 14 seaports are planned including 89 wharf areas, ports with 208 wharves with a total length of 36,923 m; for inland waterways, 27 water transport routes with a length of 1,263 km are planned; for railways, there are 1,332 km of the North-South railway line.

Regarding investment, according to the Spokesperson of the Ministry of Construction, the process of putting into operation investment projects to build traffic works has shown that the technical solutions based on the assessment and analysis of hydrological, oceanographic and climate data series over time are basically reasonable. Most of the projects have a long-term operation period to ensure the sustainability of the infrastructure system and promote investment efficiency.

However, due to abnormal changes in weather, especially the Central region, which has had to continuously endure many strong storms, heavy rains, and floods, incidents have occurred in some locations, such as some road sections being flooded due to flood peaks exceeding historical levels, or landslides affecting transport and rescue work.

The Ministry of Construction has proactively carried out urgent tasks to overcome incidents, promptly repair and restore infrastructure to ensure continuous and smooth traffic; at the same time, the Ministry has also actively coordinated with relevant ministries, branches and localities in rescue work, supporting people to soon return to normal life after natural disasters, contributing to ensuring social security.

There are 176 flood-proof house models approved.

At the Government press conference on the afternoon of December 6, Minister and Head of the Government Office Tran Van Son said: There are two milestones for housing for people to celebrate Tet. First, the repair of over 34,000 houses must be completed by December 31, 2025 and the construction of over 1,600 new houses must be completed by January 31, 2026.

“On the morning of December 6, the Government had a thorough discussion and the Prime Minister assigned tasks to all ministries, localities, socio-political organizations, including enterprises to be able to implement the above two milestones. Regarding house models, as the representative of the Ministry of Construction shared, there are 3 models in some localities, 6 models in some localities, in total we have 176 models,” said Head of the Government Office Tran Van Son.

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