Labor export helps many poor people change their fate
In mountainous communes of Da Nang City, finding a stable job with a decent income has never been easy. Year-round clinging to fields, precarious income, many households are struggling in the vortex of lack of capital, lack of jobs, lack of opportunities to rise up.
In recent years, the cooperation program to send workers to work seasonally in Hamyang district, Gyeongsang Nam province (Korea) has created a different direction. Not only bringing in income many times higher than farming in the countryside, the program also contributes to changing the awareness, working style and economic thinking of people in mountainous areas.
By the end of March 2026, Tra Tap, Tra Leng, Tra Linh, Tra Van and Nam Tra My communes had more than 500 workers leaving for Korea to work seasonally. Each working trip lasts 7-8 months, with an average income of 250-300 million VND/person. For mountainous people, this is a very significant source of income, enough for many families to pay debts, repair houses, buy land, invest in animal husbandry, and grow long-term crops.
After working abroad for a while, Ms. Pham Trieu Man and her husband, in Tra Mai village, Nam Tra My commune, accumulated a considerable amount of money, building a house of more than 100m2 worth over 500 million VND. Not stopping there, the family also bought land to plant more than 30,000 cinnamon trees, combined with raising goats and developing more short-term crops to increase income.
Another case is the couple Ho Thi Tuyet and Dinh Van Thoi, in Tak Po village, Nam Tra My commune. After returning from Korea, the couple not only paid off all old debts but also had capital to buy cows and goats to raise. Up to now, the family's herd of cows has grown to more than 30 heads, and the herd of goats to more than 50 heads. From struggling to make a living, the family gradually stabilized, had food and savings, and became one of the households with a fairly good economy in the locality.
Such stories have made people's views on labor export change significantly. If in the early periods the locality still had to mobilize and persuade each person to participate, now many young workers have actively registered, hoping to be recruited early to go to Korea to work.
Behind those life changes is the very important role of preferential credit capital from the Vietnam Bank for Social Policies. Because to be able to leave the country, workers have to worry about a series of initial costs such as making dossiers, procedures, learning foreign languages, health check-ups, air tickets... For poor and near-poor households in mountainous areas, this is a significant burden.
Mr. Nguyen Van Hien - Director of the Transaction Office of Nam Tra My Social Policy Bank - said that the unit has created conditions for more than 170 workers to borrow preferential capital to work seasonally in Korea, with a total outstanding debt of over 5 billion VND. Up to now, all loans have been paid principal and interest on time by workers, and no cases of late payment have occurred.
Long-term policy is needed
What is worrying is that this preferential credit source is facing the risk of temporary suspension. According to the Transaction Office of Nam Tra My Social Policy Bank, the implementation of capital sources according to Resolution No. 54/NQ-HDND dated December 11, 2025 of the Da Nang City People's Council, stipulating loan support for workers going to work seasonally in Korea in the period 2023-2025, is expected to be temporarily suspended in June 2026.
If this happens, difficulties will immediately fall on the shoulders of poor workers waiting for opportunities to leave the country. The demand for working abroad is still very large, the Korean side still has recruitment needs, but just a lack of capital, many applications may be unfinished from the beginning.
Mr. Nguyen Van Hien said that in order for workers not to be interrupted when accessing capital sources, it is very necessary for the City People's Council and the Da Nang City Bank for Social Policies to consider continuing to maintain this policy, creating conditions for people to borrow capital at the right time and promptly seize job opportunities.
Not only obstacles in capital, the program is also facing many other difficulties such as quite complicated recruitment procedures; thin human resources implemented at the grassroots level. In particular, obstacles in legal basis in international cooperation signing - when communes are not border communes and are not allowed to sign international agreements with Korean localities; along with the problem of learning Korean for workers in remote and isolated areas.
In Nam Tra My, the locality has repeatedly invited teachers to open Korean language classes but was unsuccessful. There is no other way, workers have to go down to the plains to study, leading to increased tuition, living, and travel expenses. For families who are already in difficulty, this continues to be a major barrier.
Maintaining preferential capital sources, removing procedures, supporting foreign language training, and completing the legal corridor for the cooperation program with the Korean side - these are things that need to be done soon so as not to miss an effective poverty reduction direction that has been verified.
