Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh on October 5 launched a movement themed “Mai am cho dong bao toi” (houses for our compatriots) to build and upgrade houses for the needy across the nation within 450 days, the Vietnam News Agency has reported.

Addressing the launching ceremony, the Prime Minister clarified the Party and State's policy of not advocating mere growth at the expense of fairness, social progress, social security and the environment, but ensuring that people can have an increasingly prosperous and happy life.

The Government leader acknowledged, highly valued, and thanked the noble gestures and important contributions by people nationwide as well as ministries, sectors, and localities to this humanitarian movement.

He called on the whole political system, all people and the business community to join hands, with the spirit of love and mutual support and not leaving anyone behind, to promptly complete the goal of building and repairing houses for the needy, especially those in far-flung, mountains, island and border areas and from ethnic minority groups.

The PM underlined the need for strengthening inspection and supervision during the work to prevent corruption and other negative phenomena.

At the launching ceremony, President of the Vietnam Fatherland Front (VFF) Central Committee Do Van Chien called on collectives, individuals, businesses, overseas Vietnamese, foreigners living and working in Vietnam, and the whole society to provide support in cash, in kind, and efforts to help poor and near-poor households, together with the State to complete the goal of ensuring no one has to live in temporary and dilapidated houses by 2025, as set by Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh.

The VFF leader committed to ensuring that the support funds are transferred directly to the beneficiaries in an open, transparent and supervised manner.

According to Minister of Labor, Invalids and Social Affairs Dao Ngoc Dung, so far, more than 1.7 million houses have been built and repaired for the poor and people with disadvantaged backgrounds. Currently, there are still more than 400,000 temporary and dilapidated houses across the country.

At the event, representatives of ministries, sectors, localities, businesses, and donors donated more than VND5.93 trillion ($239.4 million) to the movement.