Sustainable livelihoods for disaster areas

After extreme floods from July 2025, the western part of Nghe An and the Dien Bien Dong area were submerged in floodwaters. Storm No. 5 (Kajiki) at the end of August 2025 continued to wreak havoc in the North Central region. At the end of September 2025, Storm No. 10 (Bualoi), with its terrible destructive power, continued to cause huge losses in human lives and property in a large area.

Images transmitted from the disaster area in recent days have truly shocked those who are familiar with the Northwest, Viet Bac, Red River Delta and North Central regions. In Ha Giang , known as the northernmost highland, there is now another milestone in the disaster news: the current flood peak exceeds the peak of the historic flood in 1969, with houses in the urban center of Ha Giang flooded up to the second floor. Cao Bang is also submerged in immense floodwaters.

The road from Yen Bai to Mu Cang Chai, a terraced rice field paradise preparing to welcome the golden harvest festival, has completely collapsed for kilometers through Khau Pha Pass. Live clips of landslides throwing cars off cliffs in Cat Cat tourist village (Sa Pa) or landslides at O ​​Quy Ho Pass make the story of natural disasters more intense than ever.

Along with live clips from the mountains, images of coastal villages devastated by tornadoes, people having to temporarily cover roadside tents to hold funerals for those killed by natural disasters, and villas worth tens of billions of dong in the Xuan Thanh tourist area (Ha Tinh) also being knocked down. All of them show scenes of chaos and grief.

Amidst that tragedy, the hearts of the Vietnamese people continue to shine with the spirit of “Many red silk covers the mirror/ People in the same country must love each other”. Vingroup Corporation decided to support 500 billion VND to help people affected by natural disasters with a very specific level of support, and committed to increase the budget if the actual damage exceeds the estimate.

Influential artists in the community also quickly shared with people in areas affected by storms and floods, such as singer Ha Anh Tuan supporting 1.3 billion VND, singer My Tam supporting 500 million VND... Above all, millions of Vietnamese people have been sharing each kilo of rice and packet of noodles to help their fellow countrymen, following the traditional ethics of sharing food and clothes for hundreds of years.

The relief gifts that had just been handed to the people affected by the previous flood have now become an emergency “lifesaver” for them in this flood. But what is more tragic is that many cows, calves, and other items that had just been given by the relief teams to the people as capital to build a new life were swept away by this natural disaster.

The books and notebooks that still smelled of paper, which had just been handed to the students, were now submerged by the flood. The houses that had just been erected were again knocked down by this storm. The muddy and mossy village roads that had just been cleaned up by the soldiers were now as desolate as the previous flood…

The people of the Central region have a song about resilience and indomitability when facing hardships: Going to the market to buy ten chicken eggs to hatch, but seven of them are rotten, three of them hatch into three chicks, but "the kite carries them away, the crow catches them, the third (is) eaten by a bird", which is the story of "flood upon flood, storm upon storm", of "good fortune never comes twice, misfortune never comes singly"... in the struggle for survival. Of course, no one can rely on that song forever to motivate themselves to live!

Continually facing natural disasters, no matter how great the damage is, we will all stand up and overcome the difficulties as we have experienced before. However, with the increasing intensity of damage caused by natural disasters, along with the current story of "rearranging the country", we should have a plan to re-plan the lives of people in localities that suffer from frequent natural disasters.

Everything should be calculated and planned in a long-term and sustainable livelihood program from the Party and State, and not just rely on the compassion of the community after each hardship...

AN DU

Source: https://www.sggp.org.vn/sinh-ke-ben-vung-cho-vung-thien-tai-post816058.html