Vietnam has been added to the list of eight countries that would benefit from projects led by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the UN (FAO) with total funding of US$46.6 million to support climate resilience, biodiversity, combat land degradation, and unsustainable fishing.

FAO would support Vietnam in promoting sustainable fishing. Sources: FAO

The move came following the approval decision from the Global Environment Facility (GEF) for five projects initiated by the FAO during the 60th GEF Council Meeting and the 30th Least Developed Countries Fund Council Meeting.  

According to the FAO, these projects will address critical environmental challenges, including such as land degradation, biodiversity loss, unsustainable fishing, and climate change that threaten the food security and livelihoods of hundreds of thousands of people in Asia and Africa.

They will be implemented in partnership with and co-financed by the governments of Cambodia, Cameroon, Eritrea, Lesotho, Malaysia, Senegal, Thailand, and Vietnam.

“These projects are especially welcomed after the launch of the UN Decade on Ecosystem Restoration,” said FAO Director-General QU Dongyu.“It is vital that we take action now to restore the natural systems on land and water that we rely on to achieve better production, better nutrition, a better environment, and a better life.”

The projects approved by the GEF will assist countries and communities to adopt more sustainable and climate-resilient practices, foster regional cooperation, and enact stronger policies to conserve biodiversity and deter illegal, unreported and unregulated (IUU) fishing.

They will directly benefit 441,500 people and restore over 27,000 hectares of degraded landscapes. The projects will also create 30,000 hectares of new protected areas on land and sea, and improve the management of over 765,000 hectares of landscapes and 4 million hectares of marine habitats. 

Their action is designed to mitigate 6.8 million tons of greenhouse gas emissions and move 547,393 tons of over-exploited fish stocks to more sustainable levels.

Vietnam has been combating IUU fishing for the past four years.

Among the FAO-led projects, a regional project in the Gulf of Thailand will promote sustainable fisheries management in Cambodia, Malaysia, Thailand, and Vietnam.

By adopting an ecosystem approach to fisheries and strengthening fisheries governance, the project will help conserve marine biodiversity and reduce the excessive exploitation of overfished fish stocks, while supporting the sustainability of fisherfolk livelihoods.

The four projects approved in Africa will address the threats of climate change and land degradation to enhance the climate resilience of communities, safeguard natural resources, and strengthen agricultural value chains to improve rural livelihoods.

Since December 2018, FAO has mobilized more than US$550 million in GEF grant funding for member countries, including the latest projects, making FAO one of the top four GEF agencies globally.