In the past two months, natural disasters caused Vietnam 30 trillion dongs ($1.3 billion) in economic damage and killed 192 people, with 57 still missing, authorities said on Wednesday, with its central provinces bearing most of the losses.
Vietnam’s central region had had a tough year, with its essential tourism industry crippled by the coronavirus pandemic long before the arrival of nine typhoons that wiped out crops and damaged the homes of hundreds of thousands of people.
The two-month toll surpassed losses for the whole of last year when disasters killed 132 people and caused 6.2 trillion in damage, official data showed.
“We embraced nine typhoons and two tropical depressions in just two months, from mid-September to mid-November. Those abnormal weather events cost our country 30 trillion dongs,” said Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development Nguyen Xuan Cuong in a government statement.
“We have to make sure our residents are not homeless, suffering from hunger, or lacking freshwater post-typhoon,” Cuong added.
Vietnam’s economic growth is expected to slow to 2%-3% this year after expanding 7.02% in 2019 due to the broader impact of the coronavirus pandemic and natural disasters.
Vietnam is prone to destructive storms and flooding due to its long coastline.
About 11.8 million people in Vietnam’s coastal provinces are exposed to the threat of intense flooding, with 35% of settlements on crowded and eroding coastlines, a World Bank report said in October.
