ABSTRACT
With nearly 100 million inhabitants, Vietnam is at an historic crossroads
of spatial and demographic change that will shape it for the decades to come.
The country’s urban population has effectively reached 37%, with an annual
growth rate of around 3%. This rapid urbanization process for a country that is
still predominantly rural is mainly taking place in its two major metropolises—Ho Chi Minh City and Hanoi—and is spreading from North to South along
the sea via several large agglomerations. In the South, this growth is
primarily occurring in the Mekong Delta region. This phenomenon is intrinsically
linked to the country’s political and economic opening, which began in the late
1980s with the Doi Moi. This boom has continued since that time thanks to
highly diversified industrial production, the exportation of agricultural and
manufactured products, and the proliferation of offerings and businesses in the
service sector. In the field of urban studies, little is known about the
dynamics of small and medium-sized cities and their function as intermediate
cities in their regions. Our case study explored Chau Doc in the An Giang
province, at the intersection of the Bassac and Chau Doc rivers (branches of
the Mekong) along the Cambodian border. The city has experienced remarkable
growth in recent years, mainly due to religious tourism. In fact, of the more
than 7 million visitors come to Chau Doc over the course of the year, less than
5% are foreigners. It is also a commercial and administrative center that sells
agricultural products for the whole region. According to interviews conducted
there with both administrative authorities and the general population, the city
is facing serious water issues (sanitation, water contamination, flooding) as
well as problems in terms of garbage collection, recycling and traffic
congestion, among others. Solutions to these and other issues must be
implemented in medium and long-term planning, which should translate a vision
of continuous growth for cities’ futures. Public authorities are interested but
do not have the tools necessary to control the situation. For this reason, we
argue in favor of working on urban development of intermediate cities such as
Chau Doc based on Local Sustainable Development Indicators (SDI), drawing
inspiration from various experiments conducted around the world, in the future.
While these indicators have been accepted by the Vietnamese authorities, they
are generally applied at the national level. However, if used as the first tool
of innovative urban planning, they would enable cities to develop plans and
initiatives based on rational and objective criteria.