Soc Trang Province is a land bearing many imprints of reclaiming land and fighting against foreign aggressors by people of Kinh, Khmer and Hoa (Chinese) ethnic groups, who have always united together in good and bad times and are now joining their efforts to improve their socio-economic life and preserve their unique cultures. Soc Trang Province People’s Committee President Huynh Thanh Hiep gave us a warm welcome when we met him. He told us about the bumper harvests, good prices for rice and the happiness of the people, especially the Khmer ethnic people. Talking about the last shrimp harvest, he said merrily: “There is a shrimp farm in Vinh Chau that harvested 22 tonnes of shrimp per ha, making it a record in Vietnam. Before the year 2000, one could hardly imagine of golden harvests on Soc Trang land.” President Hiep spoke so positively about the improvements that it inspired us to visit the whole province.  The President said that many things had been achieved in Soc Trang rural areas, things we who live in the big cities take for granted, especially in the villages and hamlets of the Khmer ethnic people.  Included are the construction of roads, improved accessibility to electricity, better irrigation systems, breakwaters, clinics and schools. However, he was still concerned about the number of poor households, which accounted for 17% of the provincial population, the highest rate in the delta provinces (after Soc Trang Province was separated in 1992, the poor household rate was 64%). Now, the Province is focusing on minimizing this rate. Worthy of note was the fact that various crops and animals had been farmed and raised to replace the rice monoculture. Improved farming techniques and know-how are available to every farmer, who can calculate the higher economic value from each unit of the cultivated land. The President advised us to visit different places, especially the areas inhabited by the Khmer people, where we could see clearly the advanced developments in Soc Trang Province. New vitality in the coastal district of Vinh Chau Harvest time in Vinh Chau field. Tending onion field. Onion exportation brings about financial rewards. Tiger spawn-raising yields a high economic value. Bamboo basket making, a traditional craft in Soc Trang. Vinh Chau District with 52% of its population being the Khmer ethnic people and 21% being of the Chinese origin, was easy to reach due to the newly-built My Thanh Bridge. The richness prevailed everywhere in the district, which has 47 km of coastlines and its people engaged in farming on the sandy and salt-contaminated soils. Along its roads there were shrimp-raising pools, of which some had been dried for harvest and some were newly built. The Khmer farmers were harvesting onions. They were quick in selecting the mature onions, binding them into bundles and piling them to get ready for shipment. Vinh Chau District’s purple onion is a new product of high export value. Lam Kieu Nuong, Deputy President of Vinh Chau District, said that one hectare of cultivated land brought an average net income of VND 48 million per year compared with VND 10 million per year from rice monoculture. During his talks with us, Son Khem, a Khmer cadre of Vinh Chau District, said merrily: “My wife is of Chinese origin. Our children speak the Vietnamese, Khmer and Chinese languages. My son married a Vietnamese girl. Thus there is a great family of ethnic people in my home.” Leading us to visit a garden of 2,000 ten year-old  eucalyptus trees, he said: “Selling the trees at a price of VND 80,000 each, my family will have more than VND160 million. I also raise shrimp, but I must learn the industrial method of raising the tiger prawns from Tran Trung Hieu, a farmer in Vinh Hai Commune.  He has 5.8 ha of water surface for aquaculture that yields 15 tonnes of tiger prawns per ha. Some of Hieu’s pools yield 22 tonnes of prawns per ha.” Then Son Khem calculated: “The price of one kg of tiger prawns is USD 6, so one tonne brings USD 6,000, 10 tonnes brings USD 60,000 and 100 tonnes brings USD 600,000 that is equal to VND 9 billion. What a huge number! It is said that the initial investment for building the farm reached up to VND 5 billion.” Son Khem showed us a large roadside farm.  The owner of the farm, a young man from Ho Chi Minh City who has vast experience in raising the prawns, met us by a row of prawn-raising pools. He talked about the bumper prawn harvests and the building of 6 ha of pools with an investment of VND 4 billion for the coming season. He said: “In many different ways, Vinh Chau District is endowned with natural conditions very favourable for aquaculture, depending on the investment capital and techniques used.” He believes that farmers of various ethnic groups in Vinh Chau District will quickly get rich thanks to this advantage.” Khmer beauty in Soc Trang Khmer girls performing a folk dance.   There are nearly 400,000 Khmer people in Soc Trang, the biggest number in the provinces of the Mekong River delta. They live around 90 pagodas, big and small, where reside 1,800 monks, who study, work and are hospitable. All pagodas are spacious and beautiful having their entrances always wide-open to community, which are extremely brilliant on such festive days as the Cho Chnam Thmay festival, Oc om bor water-welcoming ceremony with a traditional Ghe Ngo (boat-racing) festival, Don Ta ancestors’ anniversary, and the flower- and frock-offering festival. The architecture of Kh’leng Pagoda’s pillars. Khmer monks spend much time in studying. Ethnic pupils in Soc Trang boarding-school. The State’s policies focusing on the development of production and infrastructure in 52 communes have brought many Khmer households out of hunger and poverty. The programmes on agricultural promotion, price subsidy and loans for production and business, product-sale, together with investments in education, health care, and culture at grassroots level have yielded good results. The Province has four boarding schools for ethnic pupils and a Pali intermediate school (the only Pali-teaching school in the country) to train a contingent of Khmer cadres and teachers. Books and newspapers, as well as radio and television programmes in Khmer language provide rich practical information. Soc Trang Province boats its many relics of typical historical, artistic and ecological values, such as Kh’leng Pagoda, Ma Toc (Bat) Pagoda with thousands of bats hanging on the trees in the pagoda’s garden and Khmer museum with many antiques, and a professional folk singing, dancing and music troupe with many talented artists. Without doubt, the yellow colour of the monks’ frocks under the roofs of the peaceful old pagodas, the Robam-Duke Dance performed by beautiful, dark eyed female ballerinas with their lithe and graceful movements, as well as the strong and robust arms of young men rowing the boats at the Ghe Ngo races will leave a undeletable impression on any visitor to Soc Trang Province. Soc Trang Province:  - Area: 3,190 sq.km. It borders on the Hau River to the North, Can Tho Province to the West, Bac Lieu Province to the South and the sea to the East. - Population: 1,200,000 people, of which the Khmer ethnic people represent 29% and the Hoa (Chinese) ethnic people, 5%. - Administrative units: Soc Trang provincial capital and 8 districts including Cu Lao Dung, Ke Sach, My Xuyen, Long Phu, My Tu, Thanh Tri, Nga Nam and Vinh Chau. Soc Trang at a glance: - Soc Trang Province has seen a dramatic improvement in economic cond