Preserving Equitable Growth in Vietnam
3. Landholding and public services
3.1. Household landholding
Figure 6: Concentration Curves for Education Expenditures
Source: Calculations based on data from VLSS 1992/93, VLSS 1997/98, VHLSS 2004, and VHLSS 2006
68
market. Although all land remained under state ownership; land use rights could now be legally transferred, exchanged, mortgaged, or inherited.
Such land reforms have led to important implications in land allocation in rural areas, where agricultural land is the most important household asset. Table 11a-11d record land endowment per household with respect to diff erent types of land. Annual crop land has been the most important type of land to households but others have become increasingly important.
Compared to the early 1990s, the average perennial land area per rural household increased by 70 percent, while forestry land area per household increased to up to 90 percent in 2006. Th e increasing importance of other types of land refl ects a diversifi cation in agricultural production in rural Vietnam. Th e plantation and export growth of coff ee and other perennial crops are the driving forces behind this diversifi cation process. For annual crop land, irrigation coverage was improved substantially over the fi ft een years from 1993 to 2006, from 46 percent to 63 percent.
Calculations from Table 11a-11d reveal that land reforms, urbanization and rural industrialization translated into a decrease of nearly eight percent in annual crop land area between 1993 and 2006. Table 12 gives the average percentage of annual crop land area rented out by rural households in the same period. In contrast to the decrease in annual crop land area, the percentage of land area rented out steadily increased aft er 1998. Th is increase in the incidence of land renting out was most pronounced in the two Deltas and the Central Highlands. However, as changes in land renting out were modest, this does not imply important implications from a general view.
Table 11a . Average rural landholding, 1993 (m2)
Annual crop
Perennial Forestry Water
surface Others Irrigated Non-irrigated
Rural average 2,041 2,408 710 175 103 272 by ethnicity
Kinh/Hoa 2,232 1,974 669 71 110 175 Non-Kinh/Hoa 943 4,892 956 803 59 858 by region
Red River Delta 2,183 219 150 31 112 36 North East 1,452 2,939 318 536 155 758 North West - 6,388 1,354 2,451 180 1,707 North Central Coast 1,536 1,701 246 102 44 142 South Central Coast 1,593 1,085 162 55 - 196 Central Highlands 126 5,331 2,710 - 11 279 South East ,643 4,161 2,039 49 9 229 Mekong River Delta 3,676 4,264 1,209 - 187 178
Table 11b. Average rural landholding, 1998 (m2)
Annual crop
Perennial Forestry Water
surface Others Irrigated Non-irrigated
Rural average 2,773 1,109 1,197 1,006 1,026 1,770
by ethnicity
Kinh/Hoa 2,831 919 1,149 423 1,206 1,270
Non-Kinh/Hoa 2,461 2,116 1,454 4,092 77 4,417
by region
Red River Delta 2,106 134 239 15 4,217 199
North East 1,898 1,398 527 2,789 332 3,462
North West 835 6,265 1,083 4,213 251 3,137
North Central Coast 1,507 1,090 340 2,050 55 2,395
South Central Coast 1,651 1,023 472 78 0 1,801
Central Highlands 2,365 2,917 5,408 36 17 3,215
South East 2,790 1,736 4,350 497 14 2,323
Mekong River Delta 5,895 691 1,548 126 76 952
Table 11c. Average rural landholding, 2004 (m2)
Annual crop
Perennial Forestry Water
surface Others Irrigated Non-irrigated
Rural average 2,920 1,071 1,035 1,072 306 527
by ethnicity
Kinh/Hoa 2,884 584 941 497 337 481
Non-Kinh/Hoa 3,133 3,925 1,650 4,833 107 829
by region
Red River Delta 1,946 70 79 100 95 167
North East 2,451 1,030 827 3,813 75 586
North West 2,223 7,633 689 5,367 46 658
North Central Coast 1,998 973 220 1,489 119 526
South Central Coast 2,080 1,617 1,094 785 73 297
Central Highlands 2,343 2,955 5,384 263 35 1,937
South East 2,536 2,304 3,486 620 41 1,224
Mekong River Delta 6,099 308 863 326 1,088 393
70
Table 11d. Average rural landholding, 2006 (m2)
Annual crop
Perennial Forestry Water surface Others Irrigated Non-irrigated
Rural average 2,998 1,117 1,216 1,207 287 364 by ethnicity
Kinh/Hoa 2,963 546 1,172 512 316 336
Non-Kinh/Hoa 3,182 4,159 1,475 5,361 115 531
by region
Red River Delta 1,870 92 115 106 114 146
North East 2,356 1,057 840 4,944 214 434
North West 2,667 8,182 800 5,305 35 477
North Central Coast 2,377 985 207 1,231 38 389 South Central Coast 1,827 1,528 656 1,447 64 167 Central Highlands 2,336 3,500 6,845 1,097 42 955
South East 3,051 1,875 4,293 64 7 649
Mekong River Delta 6,145 279 985 208 989 348
Table 12: Annual crop land area rented out as percentage of total annual crop land area (%)
1993 1998 2004 2006
Rural average 3.20 2.50 3.40 5.10
by ethnicity
Kinh/Hoa 3.10 2.70 4.20 6.40
Non-Kinh/Hoa 3.60 1.60 1.10 1.80
by region
Red River Delta 0.50 2.70 4.70 6.10
North East 1.30 1.00 1.50 2.30
North West 0.60 0.60 0.50 0.50
North Central Coast 1.30 1.80 1.80 2.10
South Central Coast 0.30 2.00 1.60 4.20
Central Highlands 0.00 0.00 1.80 2.10
South East 4.00 4.20 7.00 8.90
Mekong River Delta 6.50 3.10 4.70 8.30
Source: Calculations based on data from VLSS 1992/93, VLSS 1997/98, VHLSS 2004, and VHLSS 2006
Investigation of statistics on household allocation of land reveals certain patterns in inequality with respect to geography and ethnicity. Land allocation also appears to be infl uenced by a regional pattern. As shown in Table 11a-11d, agricultural land was the most abundant in the Northwest, the Central Highlands, and the Mekong River Delta. Compared to the rural average, households in the Red River Delta and the (North and South) Central Coast were of considerably lower landholding.
Regarding diff erent types of lands, forestry land was the most abundant in the Northern Uplands areas (including the Northeast and the Northwest). Not surprisingly, households in the Northwest and the Central Highlands possess the largest areas of perennial lands in the country. Th e above analysis noted the rapid expansion in irrigation coverage during the period of 1993-2006. Th is expansion was, however, uneven across regions. As shown in Table 11a-11d, while most of the annual crops in the two Deltas were irrigated, only one fourth of the annual crops in the Northwest and 40 percent of those in the Central Highlands were irrigated in 2006.
Regarding ethnicity, it is a fact that ethnic minorities possessed more land than the Kinh/
Hoa people and that endowment advantage tended to increase over time. At the start of the land reform in 1993, an average ethnic minority-headed household possessed 63 percent more land (of all types) than an average Kinh/Hoa-headed household did. Aft er fourteen years, this advantage ratio rose to 154 percent. Th is advantage ratio can be observed for all types of land, but is most pronounced for forestry landholding. On average, ethnic minority-headed households possessed forestry land areas ten times larger than those of majority-headed households.
Although ethnic minorities are entitled to more land than the Kinh/Hoa people, debates have focused on quality of land and patterns of land use. Information on quality of land was not available from the VHLSS series, but irrigation patterns could be used to partially inform this aspect. In recent years (i.e. 2004 and 2006), while more than 80 percent of annual crop land areas of the Kinh/Hoa people were irrigated, coverage for those of ethnic minorities were only 44 percent. In addition, as ethnic minorities reside mostly in mountainous areas, their annual crop land in general may be naturally assumed to be less fertile as compared to that of the Kinh/
Hoa people, which is located in the two Deltas or in coastal crop land areas. At the same time, the agricultural extension services provided to ethnic minorities are oft en ineffi cient as they are based on wet rice cultivation techniques which are only suitable for the lowlands (Jamieson et al., 1998, World Bank, 2009). Rice varieties that are more appropriate for the soil conditions in the mountains are oft en too expensive (VASS, 2009).
Th us, endowed with better land quality, the Kinh/Hoa people were generally more successful in translating their land assets into higher returns under Vietnam’s new market economy. Th e Kinh-Hoa group diversifi ed to a larger extent within the agricultural sector. Th ey now relied more on industrial and perennial crops and less on low-value staple crops and oft en supplemented their farm income with trading or services. Th e ethnic minorities, on the other hand, tended to be trapped in producing staple and traditional agricultural products (World Bank, 2009). To make a meaningful comparison in crop patterns between ethnic minority-headed households and Kinh/Hoa-minority-headed households, this chapter uses a partial access to the Baseline Study (BLS) of Socio-Economic Development Programme for Ethnic and Mountainous Areas (hereaft er referred to as Programme 135-II) conducted on 6,000 households located in 200 poor communes under the coverage of Programme 135-II. As shown in Pham Th ai Hung et al. (2008, p.32), the land endowment advantage of ethnic minorities over the Kinh-Hoa group (as discussed above) can also be observed through this BLS in these communes.
72
[I]n general, the minority-headed households appeared to have substantially larger landholding than the Kinh/Hoa-headed counterparts. On average, the minority-headed households in the P135-II communes had an agricultural land area of 19,351 m2, meanwhile the Kinh/Hoa households had only 13,271 m2, meaning a diff erence of 6,080 m2. Th is is attributable to the diff erences in forestry land endowment across the two ethnic groups. While there were no considerable diff erences in the endowment of annual crop and perennial lands between the Kinh/Hoa and the minority in the P135-II communes, the ethnic minorities were more dependent on forestry as the most important type of household landholding. On average, the forestry landholding of the minority was four times larger than that of the Kinh/Hoa.
Table 13 illustrates the crop patterns in these communes in 2007. Th e overall pattern of agricultural land use is determined by the four main agricultural activities including paddy rice, other food crops, industrial crops, and fruits. Both Kinh/Hoa-headed and minority-headed households in P135-II communes allocated about 54 percent of their land endowment to paddy rice production. Apart from rice, the minority-headed households used most of the remaining agricultural land for other food crops, while the Kinh/Hoa-headed households allocated the remaining evenly to production of industrial crops and other food crops. As the minority-headed households concentrated mainly on rice and other food crops, these two types of crops contributed up to 40 percent of the total average income earned by the ethnic minority households in the P135-II communes. For the Kinh-Hoa households, income from paddy rice and food crops made up only 20 percent of their total income, much less signifi cant than the 40 percent in the case of their minority counterparts.
Table 13: Cr op patterns across ethnic groups in the poorest communes
Paddy rice Other food crops Industrial crops Fruits Land allocation for crops (%)
Ethnic minorities 53.87 37.49 7.52 1.12
Kinh/Hoa 55.43 19.15 19.67 5.75
% of crop income in total income
Ethnic minorities 22.95 17.24 3.47 1.13
Kinh/Hoa 15.86 4.22 6.31 1.45
Source: Compiled from Table 4.11 to Table 4.14 in Pham Th ai Hung et al. (2008)
Th e current debate on poverty and inequality in Vietnam revealed the problem of landlessness. Ravallion and van de Walle (2008) showed that landlessness rate increased by two thirds over the period of 1993-2004, from less than 8 percent to 12.3 percent (see Table 14). However, as suggested by aggregated statistics, landlessness does not necessarily imply a negative outcome. Table 14 shows that the poverty rate was consistently higher among households with land than among landless ones in all years. Ravallion and van de Walle (2008) investigated the consumption distribution of landless households between 1993 and 2004 but could not fi nd evidence for subgroups (i.e. the poor and non-poor) among them. Th ere was also a sharp reduction in the poverty rate among landless households, which occurred at roughly
the same rate as that among landed ones. It was also noted that increasing landlessness was most common among the Kinh/Hoa households. Most notably, the contraction of poverty was the most signifi cant for ethnic minority-headed households during the period of 1993-2004 when the poverty rate decreased from nearly 97 percent to 46 percent. As a result, there was a considerable gap between the poverty rates of landed and landless ethnic minority-headed households. One possible explanation for the relative better-off position of landless households as compared to landed ones is that landless households probably gave up their land for “good”
reasons such as to invest in moving out of agriculture to non-farm activities.
Table 14: Pov erty and landholding status in rural Vietnam
Rural Vietnam Ethnic minorities Kinh/Hoa
Population with land % Poverty % Poverty % Poverty
1993 92.2 70.04 96.6 89.39 91.4 66.2
1998 93.1 45.9 95 76.04 92.7 39.13
2002 86.1 38.6 96 73.96 84.4 31.44
2004 87.7 25.99 96 63.36 86.1 18.06
Landless population
1993 7.8 50.87 3.4 97.12 8.6 47.38
1998 6.9 40.51 5 80.14 7.3 34.66
2002 13.9 25.11 4 62.16 15.6 23.4
2004 12.3 18.14 4 46.41 13.9 16.6
Source: Compiled from Table 3.3 in Ravallion and van de Walle (2008, p. 54)