According to statistical reports, up to now, Yen Bai province has more than 2,700 landslides in most districts, towns and cities. In Yen Bai city alone, there are nearly 1,000 landslides.
Floods also caused many deaths and injuries, and destroyed many infrastructures, agriculture, transportation, irrigation, healthcare, electricity and water...
Implementing the direction of the Party, the State and the Central Ministries and Branches, the Provincial Party Committee, the People's Council and the People's Committee of Yen Bai province promptly issued directive documents, mobilizing the entire political system to focus on responding to floods and landslides. At the same time, immediately after storm No. 3 dissipated and the water receded, local forces and people in the localities quickly deployed measures to overcome the consequences of natural disasters. The whole province of Yen Bai has 173 communes, wards and towns with 850 thousand people, currently creating an urgent working atmosphere, restoring production and business, and stabilizing life after the floods.
Along with the strong direction and effective support of the Central Government, the spiritual and material sharing of provinces, cities and people nationwide, resources, including additional policy capital to Yen Bai, have also increased significantly to support ethnic people to overcome difficulties.
Accompanying the provincial government and people, the Yen Bai branch of the Vietnam Bank for Social Policies has promoted cooperation with local authorities and socio-political organizations; operating with the highest capacity and quality.
Mr. Nguyen Thanh Hai - Director of the Yen Bai Provincial Branch of the Social Policy Bank said: According to the preliminary report, there are about more than 3,000 households borrowing policy loans in Yen Bai affected by floods with an amount of over 88 billion VND. Along with that, the urgent need for additional capital in 2024 to overcome and restore production and business after natural disasters is 442 billion VND, focusing on preferential credit programs for poor households, loans for repairing and building new clean water and environmental sanitation works in rural areas, job creation programs, loans for building social housing, etc.
To quickly support people with loans who suffered damage and overcome the consequences after the flood, officers of the Social Policy Bank Transaction Offices of districts and towns crossed dozens of kilometers of muddy and rocky forest roads to reach remote communes, especially in Van Chan, Luc Yen, Bao Yen, Tram Tau districts, etc. Carrying with them briefcases of documents, bags of instant noodles, bottles of drinking water... they stayed in the damaged areas to carry out the task of checking, determining the damage and guiding people with loans to prepare documents to request handling of risky debts...
Notably, right after the storm and flood passed, most of the transaction points at the communes of the VBSP in Yen Bai province resumed normal operations. While organizing compensation transactions, they also focused on prioritizing capital from collecting old debts, along with newly added capital, to make the fastest and most convenient disbursement to those affected by the storm and flood.
Attending the post-flood transaction session of the Social Policy Bank at the Tuy Loc Commune Transaction Point, Yen Bai City, was quite different from the usual transaction sessions. The leaders of the Savings and Loan Groups came this time not to pay savings interest, because the Social Policy Bank has a policy of temporarily suspending the collection of loan interest for customers affected by storm No. 3 until the end of 2024.
Although it has not been allocated new additional capital, the VBSP has also prioritized disbursing more than 1 billion VND to households in the commune, focusing on the rural clean water and environmental sanitation loan program and the job creation program, to help people soon restore production and business and stabilize their lives.
Mr. Nguyen Anh Tuan - Chairman of Tuy Loc Commune People's Committee said: "We believe that with the support of all levels and sectors, especially the companionship of the Social Policy Bank, the locality will soon return to the "brand" of the first new rural commune in Yen Bai province".
Leaving Tuy Loc commune, we visited Mr. Truong Van Hai's family in Ngoi Chang hamlet, To Mau commune, Luc Yen district, about 100km from Yen Bai city. Mr. Hai is currently borrowing 40 million VND from the district's Social Policy Bank and paying this debt has become even more difficult for him, when the recent terrible flood has destroyed all the orange orchards and acacia hills that were about to be harvested, and killed 3 cows and the family's herd of pigs.
Director of the Luc Yen District Social Policy Bank Transaction Office, Duong Quoc Tuan, said that the total outstanding debt of the unit to date is over VND 816 billion. Recently, the damage caused by storms and floods in Luc Yen district is estimated at several tens of billions of VND. Implementing the direction of the superiors, the unit has coordinated with local authorities and socio-political organizations to review damaged borrowers to apply appropriate risk handling measures in accordance with regulations. At this time, each poor household damaged by storms and floods in the locality is entitled to borrow from VND 80 - 100 million in preferential capital. In the coming time, the unit will prioritize supporting ethnic minorities, extremely difficult areas, remote areas, and areas affected by natural disasters to access preferential capital associated with national target programs on sustainable poverty reduction and new rural construction. Ensuring that 100% of poor households, near-poor households, newly escaped-poverty households and policy beneficiaries with needs and conditions are eligible to borrow policy capital.
It can be said that the Yen Bai branch of the Vietnam Bank for Social Policies has been upholding the highest spirit and responsibility, ensuring that all borrowers affected by natural disasters are reviewed and their risky debts are handled according to regulations, such as: Debt extension, debt term adjustment for loans due for repayment with loans affected after storm No. 3 (implemented for loans with debt due from September 2024); at the same time, it has not yet collected interest on loans arising from customers affected by storm No. 3 and floods after the storm until the end of December 2024.
In addition, the Yen Bai branch of the Vietnam Bank for Social Policies is also focusing on reviewing people's loan needs and disbursing loans promptly and to the right beneficiaries, with special priority given to localities severely affected by natural disasters to provide loans to restore production and business. Since September 12, the branch has disbursed loans to 90 households with a total amount of more than VND 4.5 billion.
