Part 1: Pioneering women donated land to pave the way
From the narrow, muddy paths of the past, many roads in Nghe An have now become spacious and bright. Behind that change are countless silent contributions, including women who have dared to put aside their own interests, voluntarily donated land, and even demolished the gates of newly built houses to open the way for the community. They have become typical pioneers who have spread together, contributing to creating the new rural appearance today.
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Author: Thanh Quynh - Thanh Nga
Technique: Diep Thanh
Publication date: September 20, 2025
Part 1:
Pioneering women donated land to open roads
From the narrow, muddy paths of the past, many roads in Nghe An have now become spacious and bright. Behind these changes are countless silent contributions, including women who have put aside their own interests, voluntarily donated land, and even demolished the gates of newly built houses to open the way for the community. They have become typical pioneers who have spread together, contributing to the new rural appearance today.
Quietly contributing land to beautify the countryside…
Anyone who has ever passed through the road connecting from Provincial Road 534 to the self-governing group No. 1, Village 12, Anh Son Dong Commune, will surely remember the spacious and airy road. Right at the beginning of the village is the house of Ms. Le Thi Hue (born in 1971) - head of self-governing group No. 1. With a gentle and simple appearance, she diligently takes care of each flower bush and tree in front of the gate every day. Few people know that the flower strip nearly 70m long and nearly 1m wide running along the path is the land her family voluntarily donated to beautify the village.
Talking about the journey of donating land to build a road, Ms. Hue said that it was a difficult journey, when she had fully understood the policies of the commune and the neighborhood; her family is a typical cultural family, so volunteering to donate land was a natural thing. However, to create consensus in the family, she still had to do ideological work for the members. From the reasonable analysis, not only her grandparents and children but also her husband listened clearly and the big road in front of her house was opened thanks to the family's garden land.
Ms. Tran Thi Hoai An - Head of the Women's Association of Village 12 said that in addition to donating land, Ms. Hue also made sacrifices that made the women in the association extremely precious. Pointing to the spacious and clean road today, Ms. An said: In the 1990s, it was just a small, narrow path, the road surface was less than 2m, the trees were dense, and it often collapsed during heavy rains because the road was close to the edge of the field. To prevent the road from collapsing, Ms. Hue mobilized her family and the women in the association to contribute money to rebuild the road. To encourage the movement, her family and her father-in-law's family alone donated more than 80 million VND to build the embankment, widen the corridor, and create a new look for the road.
Continuing the story, Ms. Le Thi Thuy - President of the Women's Union of Anh Son Dong commune said: "The village road runs through the agricultural production area, so during the production and harvest season, there are many buffaloes, cows and vehicles passing by. Therefore, Ms. Hue has to mobilize the women to take turns cleaning every day to keep the landscape green - clean - beautiful."
Thanks to that contribution, in 2024, village 12 completed the criteria for building new rural areas, moving towards the goal of advanced new rural areas. Ms. Le Thi Hue was recognized as an outstanding female member of the commune in 2023, and in 2024 continued to be an outstanding local self-management group leader. Her garden was also built into a standard garden model of Anh Son Dong commune with more than 100 Dien grapefruit trees combined with beekeeping for honey.
Looking back on the journey, Ms. Le Thi Hue still modestly said that those were small things for her hometown. But from those "small" things, the appearance of the village has changed, from her "sacrifices" has given more motivation for many women members to join hands to contribute, creating spacious, clean and beautiful roads.
In Hoa Bac hamlet, Tuong Duong commune, people still talk a lot about the story of Ms. Luong Thi Phui (born in 1982) - Head of the Women's Association of the hamlet, who agreed to demolish part of her house to donate more than 13 square meters of land to open the road. Her house is located close to the road, the wall is instead of a fence, so when there was a policy to widen the road, the decision to donate land meant having to demolish part of the house. "However, Ms. Phui did not hesitate, even volunteered to be the first to demolish to set an example for the people in the hamlet. Even though her family later had to rebuild part of the house, the gate and the fence behind the garden, she still happily accepted for the common good" - Mr. Lo Van Phuong - head of Hoa Bac hamlet shared.
From that pioneering spirit, the movement quickly spread throughout the village. One by one, each family in Group 10 joined in. 11 households boldly donated land, voluntarily dismantled fences, outbuildings, and cut down old trees to contribute to widening the road. The road, which was more than 120m long and only 2.6m wide, was now widened to 3.5m, becoming a clean, clear path. People could travel more conveniently, children could play more safely, and people were more excited when the appearance of the village changed day by day.
For more than 10 years as the Head of the Women's Association of Hoa Bac hamlet, Ms. Phui has become accustomed to sacrificing personal interests to foster the common good. She confided: “When the government proposed the policy of widening the road, I determined that if I did not dare to "sacrifice" first, it would be difficult to convince the villagers to listen. So I discussed with my husband and decided to demolish part of the house to donate land. At first, I felt regretful, but when I saw the wide road and the excitement of the villagers, I had more motivation to continue to mobilize my family and members to join hands.”
Collective action for change
new rural appearance
In addition to the pioneering individuals in the land donation campaign to open roads, many women's groups in Nghe An have also made strong impressions. A typical example is the Women's Association of Hung Tan hamlet (Duc Chau commune), where recently more than 30 women have donated land with a total area of over 400 square meters. In particular, there are families who have agreed to demolish the newly built gate of their house, worth hundreds of millions of dong, to contribute to beautifying the appearance of their hometown.
On the way back to Hung Tan hamlet, Ms. Phan Thi Thao (born in 1973) - Head of the Women's Association of the hamlet proudly shared that for many years, the association has always been commended by the Commune Women's Union as a collective with many contributions in the work of donating land to open roads. If we list in detail each member who donated land, it would be difficult to list them all, because there are more than 200 members, everyone has more or less made practical contributions. When mentioning typical examples, we must mention the family of Ms. Nguyen Thi Phuong (born in 1980), although she had just completed a gate worth more than 100 million VND, but when there was a policy to widen the road, she voluntarily dismantled it to open a corridor, and at the same time donated nearly 13m more.2family land to widen the road. Or Ms. Le Thi Hang (born in 1994) also agreed to demolish the old gate, rebuild a new gate and donate over 13 square meters of land when there was a local resolution to build a road.
Following Ms. Thao's guidance, we arrived at the road connecting National Highway 1A to Ben Den Parish - where the efforts of hundreds of households in Hung Tan hamlet were marked. Ms. Thao said that out of 370 households in the hamlet, 270 households were parishioners of Ben Den Parish. The spirit of solidarity and unanimity has become the strength for people to work together to implement many important local resolutions.
In 2022, when there was a project to open an inter-commune road through the parish, the road surface was designed to be 9m wide (while the old road was only 5m wide), the challenge was to persuade people to move back the fence and donate land. The village executive committee, women's association and pastoral council persistently went to each house to persuade. As a result, the 1.6km long road through Ben Den parish was completed, with nearly 2,000m² of residential land, more than 2,000m² of agricultural land, 1,600m of fence and 7 house gates voluntarily donated by the people.
Not stopping there, from 2022 to now, many roads in the hamlet continue to be expanded and constructed. The Women's Union has recorded many more outstanding examples. Among them is Ms. Nguyen Thi Khoa (born in 1996) - a poor household in the hamlet, her husband is constantly sick, she herself does whatever she is hired to do to support the whole family. However, when there was a policy to expand the road, she was still willing to donate 13m² of land. Her silent sacrifice made the people admire her even more.
On a provincial scale, by the end of 2024, Nghe An had built and upgraded a total of 11,427.4 km of rural roads; in 2024, an additional 147 km of rural roads were completed with a total cost of more than VND 227.85 billion; helping to connect rural areas with urban centers, creating favorable conditions for trade, economic development and improving the quality of life of people.
Behind these impressive figures is the indispensable role of women. They not only put aside their own interests, pioneered in donating land, voluntarily demolishing their family's constructions, but also persistently mobilized and persuaded relatives and neighbors to join hands for the benefit of the community. It is from this silent but meaningful sacrifice that collective strength has been aroused, spread strongly, contributing to realizing the goal of building new rural areas, so that Nghe An homeland becomes increasingly rich, civilized and sustainable.