IN VIETNAM, SOUND WATER DEVELOPMENT
APPROACHES YIELD POSITIVE BENEFITS
VIETNAM’S POSITIVE DEVELOPMENT TRAJECTORY OVER THE LAST TWO DECADES
With annual growth in gross domestic
product (GDP) averaging about 6.4 percent
$
over this period, Vietnam has experienced
among the fastest—and most equitable—
trajectories of development in the world.
6.4% GDP of
Prudent economic
policies, combined
with the enabling
conditions created by
a high endowment
of water, have
transformed
Vietnam from a low
income to a middle-
income country
within two decades.
Rapid economic expansion has been
accompanied by:
strong export improved access to
growth health and education
From the early 1990s, when over half the
services population lived on less than US$1.90
a day, the rate of extreme poverty has
fallen to 3 percent—among the fastest
declines in poverty ever recorded.
3%
declines
provision of
life-sustaining piped
in poverty
water to cities large inflows of
investment
Learn more: www.worldbank.org/water
IN VIETNAM, SOUND WATER DEVELOPMENT
APPROACHES YIELD POSITIVE BENEFITS
VIETNAM’S ABUNDANT WATER ENDOWMENT HAS SHAPED ITS DEVELOPMENT FORTUNES
The country is rich in water 10,200 cubic meters (m3) of
resources renewable freshwater per capita:
Vietnam’s water availability -- high
3,500 rivers of by regional and global standards.
more than 10
kilometers
(km) in length Coverage of water supply and sanitation (WSS)
services has improved sharply nationwide in Vietnam.
of the
91%
population have
Spread across access to basic
16 major river drinking water
basins
and
With plentiful
78% have access
to basic
sanitation
rainfall 2,000 With over 7,500 dams and reservoirs and 4 million
millimeters hectares (ha) of irrigated area, irrigation brings
(mm) a year livelihoods to about
1/2
the
workforce
and their
families
contributing nearly 1/5 of the nation’s income
Rivers have
determined
the locations Vietnam is the world’s 2nd-
of settlements largest exporter of rice; the
and cities, and largest producer of pepper,
the power the second-largest producer
the country’s of coffee, and the third-largest
industries. producer of aquaculture
products.
Learn more: www.worldbank.org/water