Census surveys rural areas, agriculture, fisheries nationwide

A month-long general census on rural regions, agriculture and fisheries across Vietnam began on July 1 amidst numerous difficulties facing these areas this year.

Census surveys rural areas, agriculture, fisheries nationwide

The general census covers rural households; families engaging in agricultural, forestry, salt production, and fishery activities in urban areas; and agro-forestry-fishery farms.

It will also survey communal People’s Committees, management boards of workers’ housing in rural areas, provincial-level co-ordinating offices for the national target programme on new-style rural area building, and provincial-level departments of agriculture and rural development.

It will collect information about agricultural production and support activities, along with data on rural areas such as structural changes of the rural workforce, rural socio-economic infrastructure, climate change impacts and environmental hygiene.

Information about rural residents will also be gathered, including their living conditions, access to bank loans, vocational training and job demand.

Director General of the General Statistics Office Nguyen Bich Lam said the census takes place as an array of difficulties were predicted for 2016 such as unsustainable economic growth, fierce domestic and international competition, environmental pollution and people’s poor living conditions.

It is to serve the design of plans and strategies for developing agriculture and rural areas and raising rural residents’ living standards nationwide. It also helps assess outcomes of the national target programmes on new-style rural area building, and the industrialisation and modernisation of agriculture and rural areas.

The survey will help compare criteria on agriculture and rural areas between Vietnam and other countries. Its outcomes will also provide a foundation for building a database for in-depth research in the future, Lam noted.