Vietnam: Tied to the past, seeking the future

Series

October 6, 2008

William B. Ketter The Richmond Register Mon Oct 06, 2008, 07:36 AM EDT

Vietnam is a country blessed by fertile lands, bountiful seas and an industrious human spirit. Yet the average personal income is less than $500 per year, and nearly one-third of the people live in poverty.

Dreadful as those statistics can seem, they’re a vast improvement from the country’s dark period during and after the Vietnam War and before the adoption of open-market capitalism in the 1990s.

Vietnam remains mostly an agricultural nation, mired in the farming methods of the 19th century. Women in conical hats still harvest the rice, one stalk at a time.

Now, even ordinary Vietnamese appear optimistic about their economic future, pointing to the country’s achieved goal of making the Internet available everywhere, including remote mountain villages.

“We’re on our way to a better life,” said Nguyen Ngoc, a confident 34-year-old entrepreneur from Hanoi who recently started a motorcycle tour business. “Tomorrow will be bigger and better than yesterday.”

Vietnam took a big step toward that goal when it joined the World Trade Organization two years ago, opening access to more overseas markets and attracting greater foreign investment.

The United States, which refused to trade with Vietnam for nearly 20 years after the war, signed a bilateral trade agreement with its former enemy in 2001, and is now the leading export market for Vietnamese goods, followed by the European Union, Japan and China.

On the home front, a skilled and low-wage work force competes with China, Indonesia and India for electronic and textile manufacturing jobs. Canon recently opened a large inkjet printer plant outside Hanoi. Sony, Intel, Samsung and other electronic firms are likewise bullish on the land of the dragon. Textile and shoe manufacturing are also on the move. Nike makes more than 80 million pairs of shoes in Vietnam annually.

Still, Vietnam is mainly an agricultural country, with more than 70 percent of the people living on farms and in villages, and the bulk of the economy tied to the fate of rice, coffee, tea, rubber trees, pepper plants and cashew nuts.

It also remains a contradiction between 19th century farming methods and 21st century technology — as witnessed during the 850-mile motorcycle trip from the 10,300-foot-high mountains northeast of mountains northeast of Hanoi, the national capital, to Hoi An, a charming seacoast community in the southwest.

In the country, water buffalo plough rice fields, and women in conical hats stoop for hours to harvest the crop, one stalk at a time. On their way home, they strap bundles of wood to their back for fire or balance fruits and vegetables on both ends of a bamboo pole for that night’s dinner in one and two-room homes.

But amazingly, in remote northern villages such as Phu Yen, Mai Chau and Tan Ky — where our motorcycle group of six Americans stayed overnight — Internet cafés serve tourists and locals, including teenagers playing Bubble Shooter, Raiden X and other popular online games. Mobile phones are commonplace in country and city.

“It is strange, right?” remarks Hoang Ngoc Minh, 26, a tour guide from Hanoi. “We are a country of differences. The Internet is everywhere. So too the traditional ways of living off the land.”

Dao Quong Binh, an economist and journalist with the Vietnam Economic Times, put it this way during an interview at the upscale Intercontinental Hotel in Hanoi:

“Land is the property of the people in Vietnam and no taxes or rent are required for use in agriculture,” he explains. “As we increasingly transform to a market economy, modernization will naturally take place in the rural regions along with the cities. New, more efficient techniques will be introduced.”

Binh is counting on Vietnam keeping up its fast pace. He has invested in several niche lifestyle publications, and has plans to start an auto magazine even though the Great Wheel of the country is definitely the motorbike.

Cars will inevitably replace two-wheel transportation as people gain wealth in the new Vietnam, says Binh. When that happens, they will need a reliable reference source on what kind of automobiles to buy and how to maintain them, something he expects his magazine to provide.

“It can’t miss,” he asserts.

For now, however, there are more than 20 million motorcycles, motorbikes and scooters in Vietnam, and fewer than 750,000 cars and trucks. The result is an urban sea of cycles constantly honking their horns.

Navigating this chaos is perilous. Traffic rules don’t apply, stop lights and signs are mostly nonexistent, and crossing the street by foot or driving through an intersection puts your life at risk. More than 40 traffic fatalities occur every day, making Vietnam one of the highest road death countries in the world.

The key to avoiding injury and staying alive is “always move forward. Don’t step back or stop in your tracks,” said Margie Mason, an Associated Press correspondent in Hanoi.

Good advice whether you’re walking across the street or riding a motorcycle.

William B. Ketter is vice president of news for Community Newspaper Holdings Inc., a news company based in Birmingham, Ala., that owns 89 daily newspapers. Contact him at wketter@cnhi.com. The Richmond Register is a CNHI newspaper.

Text Only

Series

Some city conflicts still need resolution “Meddling,” “political interference” and “micro-management” are just three catch phrases used by community members when asked to describe the relationship between city government and the city police.

“The relationship between the Richmond Police Department and the city appointed and elected officials can best be described as improving,” the on-site assessment of the Regional Community Policing Institute (RCPI) states.
October 15, 2008
External evaluation of RPD complete An external review of the Richmond City Police Department has been completed.

“It’s an overall picture of where we have been and where we hope to go in the future,” Chief Larry Brock said.

A group of nine Kentucky Regional Community Institute assessors turned in the nearly 90-page evaluation report, which first began in January, to Brock earlier this month.

“We invited the assessment team into the department to evaluate multiple issues as they relate to the community policing,” Brock said.
October 14, 2008
Report reflects positive changes A group of outside assessors who evaluated the city police department in late January has released its findings, which include a substantial amount of praise for the direction in which the agency is headed.

“Citizens tend to describe an ethical and honest department that appears to be improving since the ‘new chief’ assumed command,” the report from the Kentucky Regional Community Police Institute (KRCPI) reads. “Agency employees were extremely confident that the new chief would insist on a well-run, ethical department and they believe ‘things were getting better.’”
October 14, 2008
Tourism riches at bloody war sites The 1975 photograph of the last Marine helicopter lifting off the rooftop of the American Embassy in Saigon, a long line of luckless Vietnamese evacuees stranded below, created an indelible portrait of human desperation.

Those left behind had been soldiers in the defeated Army of the Republic of Vietnam (ARVN), or friends of the U.S. government. They anticipated dreadful consequences at the hands of Ho Chi Minh’s victorious vassals.

The beauty of Vietnam is evident in the hills and valleys of the northern highlands. The mist rising from the land against the morning sky creates a picture-postcard scene.
October 7, 2008
Vietnam: Tied to the past, seeking the future Vietnam is a country blessed by fertile lands, bountiful seas and an industrious human spirit. Yet the average personal income is less than $500 per year, and nearly one-third of the people live in poverty.

Dreadful as those statistics can seem, they’re a vast improvement from the country’s dark period during and after the Vietnam War and before the adoption of open-market capitalism in the 1990s.

Vietnam remains mostly an agricultural nation, mired in the farming methods of the 19th century. Women in conical hats still harvest the rice, one stalk at a time.
October 6, 2008
Vietnam: Land of communist capitalism When Ho Chi Minh’s battalions swept into Saigon 33 years ago to establish a reunited Vietnam, the communist conquerors made one critical miscalculation: military victory would make life better for the war-weary nation.
October 4, 2008
Immigration not new, but is a growing trend Many Hispanics often say they do not understand why Americans find their trek to the United States any different from the migration of Germans, Irish, Japanese and other ethnicities to America in the early 1900s.
September 24, 2008
Farm work brings many to county A strong agricultural base attracts many Hispanic immigrants to work in and eventually settle in Madison County.

When many Hispanics first began immigrating to the area, it was to work on tobacco farms, said Rona Comley, advocate/recruiter for the Madison County Migrant Program, a federal program that offers assistance to migrant families.
September 24, 2008
Legislators continue to wrestle with issue It’s highly controversial and an explosive political issue: How should the United States handle an ever-increasing population of undocumented immigrants?

From building fences and employing more border patrol agents to offering amnesty to those who already are here, proponents for reform have many ideas, but none have been implemented.

With millions of immigrants already in the U.S., and no sign of a decrease in the number of illegals entering the country, members of Congress have proposed legislation to help better control immigration.
September 24, 2008
Coming to U.S. legally an involved process Immigrating to the United States is not easy.

There are forms to be filled out, visas to be obtained and eventually, tests to be taken — not to mention the inevitable bureaucratic red tape to cut and hoops to jump through.

Yet many foreigners choose to take the road to America — both legally and illegally — because for them, the benefits far outweigh the hassles.

“Believe me, people would choose to come here legally if they had a choice,” said Sandra Anez Powell, director of Mujeres Unidas, a support group for Hispanic women. “There are people who will never qualify for a visa. And that’s why they have no choice but to come and risk their lives and their loved ones.”
September 24, 2008
More Series Headlines

Series

Search Results

Vietnam: Tied to the past, seeking the future

Have you ever attended a meeting of a local government agency or taxing district?

Site Map