Ecopark is an urban township development on the outskirts of Hanoi on the other side of the Red River in Hung Yen Province. By the time it’s finished, it will cover 500 hectares (1236 acres) with investment capital of over $8.2 billion USD. The EcoPark Satellite City Project, as it’s formally known, was approved by former deputy prime minister Nguyễn Tấn Dũng in 2004. (Dũng served as prime minister from 2006 to 2016.)

Land rights is still a huge issue in Viet Nam simply because demand is high and supply is limited. (Viet Nam is just a bit larger than the US state of New Mexico and about 7% smaller than Germany.) Ecopark was in the news nine years ago because local farmers resisted having their land repossessed. (In Viet Nam, all land belongs to the state.)

Articles with titles like Security forces seize land from Vietnam villagers (Reuters), Vietnam land clash: Arrests after police evict hundreds (BBC), and Hundreds protest land grab (United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, originally published by Radio Free Asia, a US-government-funded entity) appeared in the international media. There were also peaceful but determined protests in the city. Here’s a late April 2012 article that appeared in the English language media in Viet Nam: 20 arrested in another violent land eviction.

While the local people had no choice but to sell their land, I wish they had had advisers and attorneys who would have worked hard to get them a higher price, closer to market rate, and a better deal. That battle should have been fought in a boardroom not outside with violence between fellow Vietnamese, police and farmers.

In addition to villas, semi-detached houses, and condos, the community features a golf course, parks, schools, shops, swimming pools, tennis courts, etc. There are also two foreign universities, including British University Vietnam (BUV), and the Tokyo Human Health Sciences University Vietnam and Tokyo Medical University Hospital, both projects of the Waseda Health Sciences Education Corporation. These and another Japanese projected are described in this November 2020 Vietnam Investment Review article.

Across the street from BUV is a Vietcombank Training Center that features a three-star hotel and international conference center.

More to come.

Shalom (שלום), MAA