WB helps upgrade six Mekong Delta urban areas

The World Bank-funded project to upgrade six urban areas in Viet Nam’s Mekong Delta has entered the second phase, 2014-2017, according to the Steering Committee for the Southwestern Region.

The project has a total investment of US$ 399 million of which US$ 293 million of ODA is sourced from the WB and the remaining of US$ 106 million comes from the Vietnamese Government.

The six benefiting cities in the Mekong Delta Region include Can Tho, My Tho (Tien Giang province), Cao Lanh (Dong Thap province), Ca Mau (Ca Mau province), Tra Vinh (Tra Vinh province), and Rach Gia (Kien Giang province).

The project aims to upgrade infrastructure in six cities, build resettlement areas and canals, enhance management capacity, repair roads and improve drainage system.

Once coming into operation, nearly 2 million people in these areas would benefit directly and around 1.5 others will take advantage indirectly.

This is part of a program to upgrade national urban areas for the 2009-2020 period which has been approved by the PM.

Accordingly, around 100 urban areas (above fourth-grade cities) will be upgraded in the future./.