Vietnam's Agrarian Reform, Rural Livelihood and Policy ... - Rimisp

2.4. Better Access to Rural Infrastructure, but with Low QualityComparing to the pre-reform period 20 years ago, the rural situation has been improved dramatically.However there remains unequal access to national benefits and opportunities. 2006 statistics showthat 94.2% of the country’s households had access to electricity and 74% to clean water; 96.9% of thecommunes had road access to commune centers and 94.4% had telephone lines. However the qualityof these services was far lower compared to urban areas. According to GSO 2006 data, 21% of ruralenterprises reported that rural transport systems were very poor (compared to 13% of urbanenterprises) and 8% complained about the quality of telephone services (compared to 0% of urbanenterprises). Also there were road systems in place but not accessible to tracks and electricity wasonly used for household lighting and not for production activities.Statistics about other rural services may also be misleading. For example, as of 2006, 88.3% of thecommunes had kindergartens, 99.3% primary schools, 99.3% health clinics, 88.5% post offices cumcultural centers; 58.8% markets, 78.7% agro-forestry-fisheries extension workers and 83.6%veterinary workers. However, these figures do not indicate the level of quality of these services. Anenterprise survey done in 2006 shows that 9% of rural enterprises were not satisfied with the quality ofrural education and training systems available (compared to 1% of urban enterprises) and consideredthe quality of rural vocational training to be only half as good as that of urban areas.2.5. Weak Farmer Associations and Cooperative EconomyBy 2006, there were 7,237 cooperatives nationwide, most of which were old-style cooperatives thathad been transformed and concentrated in the North and employed 5% of the total labor force in theagro-forestry-fisheries sector. Despite Party and Government support, the role of cooperativesremains insignificant. The size of an average cooperative is equivalent to just 4% of an agro-forestryfisheriesenterprise. Surges in agricultural input prices and declines in agricultural product pricesregularly pose a threat to the 14 million small rural households who are not able to act collaborativelyand do not have the capabilities to negotiate, lodge complaints or settle disputes. At the same timefarmer unions are very weak at the grassroots level and only operate in an administrative manner atthe central level. According to a CIVICUS survey conducted in 2005, the impact of the Farmers’ Unionon rural life ranks third out of four, which clearly shows that it has not really become an organization16