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Improved Corridor, Border Procedures Open Opportunities for Minorities

SAND VILLAGE, QUANG TRI PROVINCE, VIET NAM: The Bru villagers gather around the clearing to watch a traditional sacrifice ritual. A man kneels and chants, calling upon the spirits to smile upon the visitors, the harvest and the children.

Behind him, another man beats a gong in rhythm to the invocation. In front is a tray bearing the offering -- a chicken, usually slaughtered during the rites, but on this occasion mercifully killed beforehand.

After the ceremony, village elders offer lao lao (rice wine) to the visitors.

Some 27 kilometers away, up a winding mountain road, a more modern ritual is taking place in a large, newly built factory at the Lao Bao Commercial Area. Amid the whirr and hum of machines, white-masked workers, many from nearby villages, form a production line turning out tires and tubes for motorbikes. The Thai managing director offers visitors tea.

The two worlds -the ethnic minority village and the industrial plant - are being brought closer together by the East West Economic Corridor, an ambitious upgrading project that is nearing completion.

The East West Economic Corridor stretches coast to coast from Mawlamyine to Da Nang, linking Myanmar, Thailand, Lao PDR and Viet Nam. It is a flagship project of the Greater Mekong Subregion (GMS) economic cooperation program being promoted by the Asian Development Bank in partnership with governments and other international agencies.

Together with streamlined border procedures to ease the flow of people and goods, the Corridor is bringing trade, investment and tourism to some very poor regions.

At the Lao/Viet Nam border checkpoint between Dansavanh and Lao Bao, officials processing a line of trucks say they are readying to implement a one-stop customs procedure that will reduce waiting time from several hours to 30 minutes.

The expected influx of entrepreneurs and tourists should translate into more jobs and other opportunities for the Bru and the 200 other ethnic minorities of the GMS, who mainly live in mountain areas, including the ranges that straddle Viet Nam and Laos and extend into the People's Republic of China.

Such opportunities are sorely needed in the remoter areas of Viet Nam's central region, which lack basic amenities such as safe water and electricity as well as access to social services including education and health care. Most of the children under five years old are underweight.

In Sand village, children and their parents come out of their wooden houses on stilts to gaze in curiosity at the foreign visitor, who is still an unusual sight in these parts. In one corner, women are pounding grain with wooden clubs. An elderly woman sits smoking a pipe beside the rattan basket she uses to carry firewood on her back. A teenage girl climbs some steps while carrying an infant wrapped in a shawl behind her. In the river below the village, men fish, while children play naked in the cool waters. A community leader, Ho Van Choang, who is on the ethnic minorities committee for Quang Tri Province says, "People like the tourists very much. The tourists bring not only the joy and excitement in the village but also more understanding of the outside world."

Mr. Choang says the Bru, like other ethnic minorities, welcome the greater access to social services and job opportunities that the road is bringing, but are also anxious to preserve their unique culture and traditions. The Bru are known for their folk singing and their music with drums, castanets and gongs as well as wind and string instruments.

He believes that tourist interest in Bru culture would help revive some traditional arts.

Up the road, the tire and tube plant is one of several foreign investment projects filling up Lao Bao Commercial Area, which was set up near the Lao border by the Vietnamese Government in late 1998.

"We have over 50 small- and medium-sized enterprises operating now -- 20 manufacturers and 30 in trade and services - and we want to attract more," says Nguyen Huy, deputy chief of the commercial area. "With work nearing completion on the East West Economic Corridor and the new bridge over the Mekong at Savannakhet, we want to draw investors and tourists and it is a high priority to develop our free trade area."

Mr. Huy says an important goal is to improve the socio-economic conditions for the local people, including the Bru and other ethnic minorities who make up 10% of the population of 33,000.

The commercial area has brought water, electricity and transport services for the first time. In the past three years, it has also created over 1,000 jobs for local people.

Foreign investors are using local raw materials, says Mr. Huy, citing one enterprise that is making cassava flour and another that is processing coffee. The foreign companies are also providing training and some have sent staff to Thailand and Viet Nam's big cities to upgrade their skills.

At the tire plant, Phornchai Chiravinijnandh, managing director of Camel Rubber (Vietnam) Co. Ltd, says the plant is the Thai company's first overseas manufacturing venture and that the upgraded Corridor will give them markets in Laos and Viet Nam as well as an export seaport in Da Nang.

Mr. Chiravinijnandh says the Lao Bao venture is not without teething problems. He is still trying to access rubber from the local market. On the administration procedures, he says, "There are still many regulations and procedures that have to be made easier and faster for investors."

Nonetheless, the company plans to expand production from motorbike tires to truck tires. This would mean increasing a workforce that includes 130 Vietnamese and 15 Thais.

Despite hiccups, the Lao Bao commercial area is developing according to expectations and the government is taking steps to encourage foreign investors to invest in other parts of the country and form partnerships with local businesses.

Clearly, improved physical infrastructure and easier cross-border procedures are already providing incentives for businessmen - and jobs for the poor.

* The author is Principal External Relations Specialist for the Asian Development Bank

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