Kon Tum (VNA) – Party General Secretary Nguyen PhuTrong has suggested the Central Highlands province of Kon Tum focus on developinghigh-quality agriculture and border gate economy and making use of forestadvantages to attain faster and sustainable growth.

At a working session with provincial officialson April 14, he applauded the province’s efforts to brave difficulties todevelop.

Kon Tum shares more than 280km of borderlinewith Laos and Cambodia. More than 53 percent of the local population are ethnicminority people while 42 percent are religious followers.

In 2016, its gross domestic product exceeded 11trillion VND (485.1 million USD), up 8.06 percent from the previous year. Whileannual per capita income reached 32 million VND (over 1,400 USD), more than 1.9trillion VND (nearly 83.8 million USD) was collected for the State budget lastyear.

Kon Tum has set up Mang Den – a 150-hectareagricultural area using high technology – along with some zones specialising inindustrial trees (such as rubber, coffee) and herbal plants (such as Ngoc Linhginseng).

Industrial production value increased by 14percent while export revenue hit 113 million USD in 2016. In the first quarterof 2017 alone, the province earned 57 million USD from exports, shooting upmore than 300 percent from a year earlier.

Poverty reduction has been stepped up, reducingthe household poverty rate from 26.11 percent in 2015 to 23.03 percent in 2016according to the multidimensional poverty measurement.

The Party leader, who is touring the Central Highlands,lauded Kon Tum’s performance in ensuring defence, security, social order andsafety, fighting crimes, and strictly handling deforestation cases.

However, it remains a poor province withuntapped development potential, modest economic growth and per capita income,limited human resources quality, and underdeveloped infrastructure, he noted.

Suggesting several fields that Kon Tum shouldpay heed to, General Secretary Trong said the province should invest more inhigh-quality and large scale agriculture. 

He took Ngoc Linh ginseng as an example, saying thatKon Tum should expand the cultivation and processing of this indigenous specieswhile applying technology in processing and surveying the market to ensure thesale of ginseng products. Clean vegetable and sugar canes are also suitable forfarming here, he added.

He told local officials to boost border gateeconomic activities to capitalise on the province’s location, which isfavourable for trade with Laos, Cambodia, Thailand and Myanmar.

It is also necessary to protect forests andoptimise forest advantages to improve local living standards and conserve theenvironment, the leader said, stressing the must for keeping political securityand social order and safety, doing a good job of external activities, andmaintaining peace and stability for development.

On April 13, the Party chief visited Kon Ro Bang 2 hamlet ofVinh Quang commune and the Kon Tum Sugar Joint Stock Company in Kon Tumcity.-VNA