The Ministry of Labor, Invalids and Social Affairs needs VND42,800 billion (US$ 1,961,989) mainly taken from the state budget for sustainable poverty reduction during the period 2016-2020, said Deputy Prime Minister Vu Van Ninh at a meeting on sustainable poverty reduction yesterday.
The fund will be used for six projects. They will be spent on building infrastructure in poor communes and districts in island and coastal areas, expanding models of sustainable poverty reduction, supporting poor households and poor ethnic minorities working abroad, disseminating and improving the program's supervision and assessment.
Speaking at the conference, Mr. Vu Van Ninh, Deputy Prime Minister cum the head of the national program, asked ministries to set up detailed plans for projects in the program, in which the Ministry of Finance and Ministry of Planning and Investment play an important role in state budget balance for projects .
The two ministries should give priority to areas with high rates of poor households, the Deputy PM said.
In addition, two ministries must increase loans for the poor and help more poor households, households living near the poverty line and households escaping from private borrow funds.
The Prime Minister has issued a decision to decrease loan interest for low-income families from 7.2 percent a year ( or 0.6 percent a month) to 6.6 percent a year ( or 0.55 percent per month)
The national program on sustainable poverty reduction for the period 2016-2020 aims at speeding up the poverty reduction process, preventing people from re-entering poverty situations - and creating conditions for the poor to access basic social services including medicine, education, accommodation, clean water and hygiene.
It is hoped to decrease the rate of poverty households in the country by 1-1.5 percent a year, especially in disadvantaged districts which have the rate of poverty households of over 4 percent a year.
