World Bank Report Charts a Sustainable Pathway for Viet Nam’s Mekong Delta

Can Tho, December 17, 2025-A new World Bank report, "Living or Leaving: Life in the Mekong Delta Region of Viet Nam", finds that mounting environmental and economic pressures are reshaping the Delta and calls for a people-centered strategy that invests in strengthened skills, advanced infrastructure and resilient, higher-value agriculture to protect livelihoods and sustain growth.

Grounded in updated household and labor-market data, the report highlights how the Mekong Delta can adapt and sustain its role as the nation's agricultural heartland while raising productivity, moving up the value chain and aligning with Viet Nam's broader economic transformation.

"Given the scale of environmental vulnerabilities the region is facing, the question is no longer whether adaptation is needed, but how it should be pursued," said Mariam J. Sherman, World Bank Division Director for Viet Nam, Cambodia, and Lao PDR. "Public investment will need to strike a balance between safeguarding land and infrastructure that remain vital to local livelihoods, and building the skills, resilience, and support that people need to pursue opportunities in an adaptive future."

Since 2018, repeated droughts and saltwater intrusion, along with more frequent floods and extreme heat, have reduced farm incomes across the Delta. This has prompted nearly 1.7 million residents to migrate over the past decade as households look for more secure livelihoods. Yet the report finds that migration alone is often an insufficient buffer against economic shocks. While around 14 percent of households in the Mekong Delta reported having a migrant member, only 58 percent of these households receive remittances-and nearly half of those transfers are less than 5 million VND per year, an amount insufficient to lift families above the national poverty line.

At the same time, the region's economic weight has slipped: its share of national GDP fell from nearly 20 percent before 2000 to 12.4 percent in 2024, and it attracted just 3 percent of Viet Nam's foreign direct investment in 2023.

To prepare communities for a more volatile future, the report argues that development policy should focus on people as much as places. That means investing in education, skills and the ability for residents to move for work, adapt and prosper, whether they stay in the Delta or pursue opportunities elsewhere.

The report recommends five priority areas for action:

• Expanding skills training so workers, especially young people, can move into higher value jobs;
• Transforming agriculture to be less labor-intensive, more resilient and more profitable;
• Upgrading local infrastructure to attract investment, improve connectivity and lower costs for farmers;
• Supporting safe, voluntary migration as one option for those seeking opportunities in other regions; and
• Building a more adaptive social protection system to assist people affected by shocks, particularly those unable or unwilling to migrate.

The report was prepared with financial support from the Australian Government through the Australia-World Bank Strategic Partnership (ABP2).