Mai Hương, Director of the provincial Forest Protection and Development Fund, stated that the main reasons are due to some forest areas being in dispute or overlapping; discrepancies between decisions and allocation maps, between decisions and forest owners’ personal identification papers; incorrect forest owner information; and dossiers, decisions, and land/forest allocation maps not being fully handed over to the Fund.

Some forest owners are not present locally, have died, are serving prison sentences, or are completing procedures to open bank accounts to receive payments. Some forest owners do not have the need or do not want to receive money because the allocated forest area is small, the payment amount is low... these are also reasons causing the backlog of FES payments.

In Thanh Yên commune, as of September 2025, there is still over VND 1.8 billion in FES money from 2018 to 2024 unpaid. This is the money of 6 forest owners in the area of the former Noong Luống commune.

The main reason is that forest owners are serving prison sentences, forest owners have died; or forest owners have compartment numbers that do not match between the allocation decision and the land/forest allocation map. These obstacles have affected the progress and effectiveness of implementing the FES payment policy in Thanh Yên commune in particular and the entire province in general recently.

Step by step removing obstacles, from the beginning of the year until now, the provincial Forest Protection and Development Fund has implemented a series of drastic solutions to ensure effective, timely, and transparent FES payments.

Last September, the Fund advised the Department of Agriculture and Environment to issue Plan No.3729/KH-SNNMT regarding working with the People’s Committees of communes to resolve difficulties and obstacles in implementing the forest environmental service payment policy in Điện Biên province.

Accordingly, from September 25 to October 2, the provincial Forest Protection and Development Fund worked with the People’s Committees of 8 communes: Pu Nhi, Na Son, Núa Ngam, Si Pa Phìn, Na Sang, Nà Tấu, Mường Phăng, and Sáng Nhè. These are all communes with many inadequacies and obstacles in FES payment work, involving a total of 304 forest owners.

At the working sessions, leaders of the provincial Forest Protection and Development Fund and the Fund’s working delegation, together with leaders of the People’s Committee, commune professional divisions, forest ranger agencies, and forest owners conducted exchanges, discussions, and specific deliberations on how to handle and resolve issues for each forest owner and each cause of obstruction.

In addition to actively coordinating to resolve obstacles and completing procedures related to FES payments, from the beginning of the year until now, the provincial Forest Protection and Development Fund has organized 7 rounds of information dissemination, guidance, and support for forest owners to complete procedures and open accounts at the grassroots level for 2,407 forest owners. This contributed to bringing the total number of forest owners who have opened accounts to date to 7,087/7,540 forest owners, reaching 93%.

With the focus on implementing many solutions to resolve obstacles, to date, the provincial Forest Protection and Development Fund has completed FES payment procedures for 435 forest owners, with a total amount of VND 4.8 billion. Receiving FES money encourages people, communities, and forest owners to actively participate in protecting forests sustainably.

At this time, the backlog of unpaid FES money from 2013 - 2024 is over VND 4.5 billion belonging to 597 forest owners with a total area of over 3,733ha. To disburse this source of money soon, the provincial Forest Protection and Development Fund continues to coordinate with Commune People’s Committees and relevant agencies to support and urge the handling and resolution of obstacles related to land and forest allocation dossiers; forest owners with incorrect information; allocated forest areas still in dispute or overlapping... At the same time, strengthen coordination in information dissemination, urging, and supporting forest owners who have not opened accounts to proceed with opening accounts to receive money.

“In the coming time, the unit will continue to specifically review forest owners with unpaid FES money backlogs, especially cases where forest owners have had backlogs for over 2 years without receiving money. The Fund will report and propose to the Fund Management Council, the provincial People’s Committee, and the provincial Department of Agriculture and Environment to seek policy approval to merge the FES money backlog of many years into the annual unallocated FES fund to regulate payments for forest areas with low unit prices in the province,” added Mai Hương.