A pottery village in peripheral areas of Hanoi

 Urbanization has gradually reduced the area of agricultural land in the suburbs. This issue was the main theme for discussion at the nineteenth Vietnam-France Economic and Financial Forum recently held in Hanoi as part of work between the Ministry of Planning and Investment, the French Development Agency, and the French Embassy in Vietnam.

 Urbanization is taking place rapidly in Vietnam and at present the country has 752 cities, including two urban areas, including the two special: Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City. The Urbanization rate has reached 31 percent, with a total natural land area of about 31,000sq.km, of which, inner cities accounted for over 12,000sq.km.

According to the World Bank (WB), Vietnam is leading Southeast Asia in terms of urbanization rate. In 1986, the proportion of Vietnam's urban population was 19 percent (about 11.8 million people) and in 2010, that proportion increased to 30.5 percent (approximately 26.3 million people).

Speaking at the forum, Deputy Prime Minister Hoang Trung Hai said, urbanization was a common trend and was one of objective criteria for determining whether a country in the world was a developed or a developing country.

In this context, the management and development of the suburbs are crucial to the planning and establishment of Vietnam's urbanization toward modernization and sustainability.

At the forum, there were 15 thematic reports presented, with focus on groups of issues including job change for farmers in urbanized areas, the potential for Hanoi's peripheral craft villages, land management land in urbanized areas, the impact of the process of urbanization with local economic life and society, financial tools and solutions to support local people in urbanized areas, and traffic jams in Hanoi.

Experts have exchanged information related to the urban development process in general, peripheral areas in Vietnam in particular in recent years, and the existing problems such as inadequate planning and lack of a master plan, lack of infrastructure, unemployment, air pollution, and decreased social welfares. They agreed that next time, it is needed to focus on integrated and multi-dimensional researches as part of preparation for the transition of land use purposes as well as the accompanying demands for sustainable development of suburban areas, taking into account the conservation and promotion of indigenous intangible cultural value, and the prevention of damage or undue disadvantage on suburban life, job and income, social environment and nature, while meeting the needs of education and health for suburban people.

Although the country was faced with the phenomenon of urbanizing strongly in the years 1950-1960, the impact of this process continues affecting society today. The French government has succeeded in applying the measures with institutional characteristics, such as building new towns around Paris, made the land management tools for long-term vision based on systematic planning of the country and coupling the minor plans together, coordinated allocation of funding, researched for tools for spatial planning of the territory to the harmonious development between urban and rural areas towards sustainable development.

With the French experience in this area, Vietnam hopes to learn as much practical experience to prepare solutions and management policies for sustainable development of suburban areas in Vietnam.

Sharing urban planning experience, Christian Jacob, the co-chairman for that forum said, "To implement an effective planning and attract investors, the coordination between agencies and sectors should be as close as possible. In addition, it is needed to have long-term vision with three main objectives including ensuring the sustainability of economic development while taking into account environmental factors and approaches with public services to benefit suburban people.

Agreeing with that viewpoint, Science Advisor Marc Cabane expressed, "Urbanization in Vietnam is happening very quickly. That means environmental pollution is also increasing. Therefore, it is necessary to have an overall urbanization planning strategy with vision toward sustainable economic development associated with environmental protection.

Reportedly, the researches and recommendations of the experts mentioned for land management and urban planning at the forum will be gathered and reported to the Government of Vietnam.

Nguyen Huong

(MONRE)