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State of the Basin Report - 2003Even though the industrial sector increased Figure 3. Sector share of employment anddramatically, in 1999, nearly 70 percent of theGDP, Viet NamVietnamese population were still employed inagriculture. 30Agricultural production is dominated by rice,which accounts for half of agriculturalproduction. Production methods have beenintensified and rice yields are now among thehighest in the region. Vietnamese farmers havealso begun to diversify into other agriculturalproducts. Perennial cash crops such as rubber,coffee, tea and fruit are grown in significantamounts. 31Expansion in the industrial sector in the earlyNote: Employment information reflects available data for1990s was largely due to growth in most recent years 1997-2000. Agriculture includes forestymanufacturing. 32 In the late 1990s, heavy and fisheries.industry, including mining, oil production and Source for employment: ESCAP. 2002.construction, became the most important drivers Sources for GDP: ADB. 2002. Asian DevelopmentOutlook 2002. ADB. 2001. Country Strategy Programs.of growth. The country now has major oil andIMF. 2002. Selected Issues and Statistical Appendix.IMF.gas earnings. The service sector also increased 2002. Selected Issues and Statistical Appendix..strongly in the 1990s, providing large numbersof new jobs. During the crisis in 1998, the service sector stagnated and unemployment began torise. 33Although industrialisation has increased in Viet Nam, it is not evenly distributed across the country.People living in the LMB region of the country, which comprises the Central Highlands, the MekongDelta and a small area in the northwest of the country, are still heavily dependent upon agriculturefor their living. Agriculture comprises around 70 percent of GDP in the Central Highlands, eventhough rice yields are well below the national average. Likewise, manufacturing production in theCentral Region is generally very underdeveloped.In the Mekong Delta, agricultural production accounts forabout 55 percent of the regional GDP. Industrial output isabout 9 percent of the country’s total. It seems that althoughViet Nam is, on average, more industrialised than Lao PDRand Cambodia, the people in the LMB areas have similarliving conditions to Laotians and Cambodians. In general,these populations depend on agriculture for theirlivelihoods and, as such, are vulnerable to flooding anddrought.The government of Viet Nam pursues a policy of continuedindustrialisation and structural reforms described in ‘Socialand Economic Development Strategy, 2001 –2010’.Poverty alleviation is a main target, and the goal is toreduce poverty levels to less than 10 percent of thepopulation by 2005, as measured by VietnameseStructural steel being loaded at Can Thostandards. 34 Port in the Viet Nam Delta90