Many workers, many boarding houses, little social housing
Dong Nai is a province with 1.3 million workers, of which workers from other provinces account for about 60%. However, in areas with a large number of workers in Dong Nai province such as Bien Hoa City, Trang Bom District, Nhon Trach District, Vinh Cuu District..., the dormitories for workers are quite dilapidated, while social housing is scarce.
According to statistics, Dong Nai province has about 20,000 boarding houses with more than 150,000 rooms. Bien Hoa city alone has over 200,000 workers, 6 industrial parks and many small and medium enterprises, attracting workers from all 63 provinces and cities across the country to work.
Ms. Vu Thi Duyen, a worker at a leather shoe company in Bien Hoa City, who lives in Long Binh Ward, Bien Hoa City, said that due to low income, workers only hope to buy a small, cheap social housing unit in installments, because the current life in a rented house is very poor.
Currently, many landlords in Dong Nai said that due to lack of work, many workers have checked out. According to the Dong Nai Provincial Federation of Labor, since the COVID-19 pandemic, a large number of workers have moved from Dong Nai to other provinces, estimated at 50,000 - 60,000 people, mainly concentrated in the South Central, Southwest, and Central Highlands provinces.
According to the representative of the Dong Nai Province Industrial Parks Management Board, the formation of industrial parks in the Central and Northern provinces will make it more convenient for workers to move back to their hometowns in these provinces to live and work compared to their current life in cramped boarding houses.
Building social housing to retain workers
Mr. Huynh Tan Dat, Standing Deputy Secretary of Bien Hoa City Party Committee - said that recently, the locality has paid attention to upgrading boarding houses to ensure that workers have enough living conditions. After the pandemic, the economy was difficult, boarding house owners increased the rent, the Standing Committee of Bien Hoa City Party Committee worked with boarding houses during difficult times not to increase prices, ensuring stability for workers, and at the same time building social housing for low-income people.
According to many migrant workers living and working in Bien Hoa City, many provinces are opening many industrial parks and industrial clusters, so many workers tend to return to their hometowns to work at factories near their homes to reduce the burden of renting houses, and their children also have a stable place to live and study. Therefore, in order to retain and recruit more workers to work in the province, Dong Nai needs to prioritize and focus on implementing many social housing projects for sale and rent.
Recently, Dong Nai province has paid great attention to implementing social housing projects in localities with great demand such as Bien Hoa City, Long Thanh, Nhon Trach, Trang Bom... In the period of 2021-2025, Dong Nai aims to build 10,000 social housing units, and by 2030, build at least 50,000 social housing units. However, the number of projects with full legal documents to start construction and complete is very small.
Recently, Dong Nai Provincial People's Committee has assigned Chuong Duong Homeland Joint Stock Company more than 1.4 hectares of land to build 1,000 social housing units, with a total project investment of VND 1,400 billion, equivalent to a population of about 1,900 people, to be built on Nguyen Van To Street, close to large industrial parks in Bien Hoa City. The project is expected to officially come into operation from August 2025.
Mr. Nguyen Tuan Kiet, Director of Thanh Thang Design and Construction Consulting Company Limited (investor of the social housing project in Bao Vinh Ward, Long Khanh City) said that up to now, the investor has received more than 300 customer applications. Of which, about 60 completed applications have been verified for subjects and income conditions, however, the remaining 240 cases are facing difficulties and are continuing to carry out procedures.
