New Freshwater Aquaculture Systems in the Red River Delta of Vietnam : Evolution of a Key Role in Food Systems and Rural Development
37 suggesting that aquaculture is the key component of Integrated Agriculture Aquaculture ( IAA ) farming , commonly known as the “ VAC ” model . This acronym is derived from the Vietnamese words for orchard ( vuon ), pond ( ao ), and livestock pen ( chuong ), and was the farming system become popularly to exploit in the 1980s in order to project and to expand food security strategies . The VAC system ’ s success among the local and rural people in terms of food security pushed the Vietnamese government to implement the Sustainable Aquaculture for Poverty Alleviation ( SAPA ) strategy and to carry out the Programme of Hunger Eradication and Poverty Reduction ( Luu , 2002 ). Initially , the system was introduced in the Red River Delta area and then became widespread and developed in other regions . As a result , freshwater aquaculture became a strategy in sub-sectors to improve nutritional standards and to generate income in small-scale farming households ( Luu et al ., 2002 ; Pekar et al ., 2002 ).
In Hai Duong , a central province of Red River Delta in northern Vietnam , rice cultivation is still the traditional and principal source of income for farmers . Alternative land use and livelihood options such as aquaculture , fruit production , and livestock ( Hanh , Ton , & Lebailly , 2013 ) are integrated components in farms and create more cash income , food , and foodstuffs in order to meet subsistence needs ( Lebailly et al ., 2015 ). In this province , the targeted areas to develop freshwater aquaculture were those large lowland areas of rice fields which had low productivity and were being inefficiently utilized due to unstable crops during the flooding season . Statistical data and records indicate that , by 2014 , the land used for aquaculture had expanded rapidly , increasing by 64 % from 5,668 ha in 1996 ( Hai Duong Statistics Office , 1999 , 2014 ). Government policy strongly supported these changes . Since 1999 , the Vietnamese government and local authorities have promoted the restructuring and diversification of the agricultural sector with the goal of reducing the share of rice in the total agricultural output value while increasing the contribution of aquaculture to economic growth . This policy resulted in the growing importance of aquaculture and is reflected in the following figures : in 1996 , aquaculture production contributed approximately 2.7 % to the total gross production of agriculture in Hai Duong and in 2014 , it made up 12 %. Between 1997 and 2014 , aquaculture production increased annually by 13 % and in surface area by 3.9 % annually ( Hai Duong Statistics Office , 1999 , 2014 ).
II . Methodology
As qualitative and quantitative methods were employed in this study , the secondary data were gathered from the local statistical offices and annual records at the survey sites . In addition , primary data and information ( group discussions and household interviews ) were used for the research analysis of household aquaculture data , including information such as general characteristics of households , their aquaculture