HCM CITY — Some 730,310 poor households and other welfare beneficiaries in HCM City have got soft loans from the Việt Nam Bank for Social Policies since 2003.

The information was released at a conference to review social policy credit in 2003-17 under the Government’s Decree 78/2002/NĐ-CP held on Thursday by the city People’s Committee.

The conference was attended by leaders of the city Party Committee and People’s Committee and officials from the Việt Nam Bank for Social Policies (VBSP) and relevant agencies from the city’s 24 districts.

The director of the city VBSP, Trần Văn Tiên, said in HCM City his bank had had 10 key programmes for lending to poor families since it was established in 2003.

These loans helped more than 225,460 poor and policy beneficiary families escape poverty, created 220,380 jobs, 275 of them abroad, and helped over 88,850 poor students to continue studying.

It has also funded the construction of nearly 210,700 rural clean water and environmental treatment facilities and enabled more than 56,400 families to acquire land.

As of the end of August the HCM City branch had loans outstanding worth around VNĐ2.85 trillion (US$126 million), nearly 19 times up from 2003, with bad debts accounting for only 1.9 percent.
The city poverty rate declined from 0.57 percent in 2013 to zero percent last year.

Representatives of the city Association of War Veterans, Women’s Union and branches of the VBSP in the city’s districts also reported on results, shared experiences and suggested solutions for implementing the policy.

Lương Thị Lan Hương, a resident of Cần Giờ District’s Long Hòa Commune, said she had got loans that helped her family escape poverty and improve its living standard and enabled her children to continue studying.

With the loans she set up a shop and also sold vegetables.

“Now my older child is working at Hospital 115 in District 10, and the younger one is studying in a college in the city.”

The general director of Việt Nam Bank, Dương Quyết Thắng, praised the VBSP’s achievements in implementing the Government’s decree on credit for poor people and other beneficiaries over the last 15 years.

“The HCM City VBSP has enabled people to escape poverty and helped the city become one of the leaders in implementing the national programme on sustainable poverty reduction.”

Nguyễn Thị Thu, deputy chairwomen of the city People’s Committee, said the VBSP should focus on addressing its shortcomings, improving its efficiency further, and follow the city’s orientations and development targets to improve people’ lives and reduce poverty.

On the occasion, 64 individuals and eight organisations were awarded certificates of merit for their contributions to the implementation of social policy credit in 2003-17. — VNS