The Vietnamese Government will conduct a nationwide agriculture and fisheries census next July.

The survey is being conducted to serve the country's socio-economic development policies.

In accordance with Prime Minister Nguyen Tan Dung's instructions, themonth-long census, which will start on July 1, 2011, aims to collectbasic information about the country's rural and agricultural sector.

The census's results are expected to serve as a basis for assessing the implementation of national programmes in rural areas.

Accordingly, the number of production units, labourers and labourstructures along with how technology is affecting production and theenvironment will be surveyed.

In addition, the census willprovide an overview of the transformation of the country's ruraleconomy and socio-economic infrastructure.

Informationconcerning living conditions and individual's ability to access loansand vocational training standards will also be surveyed.

The census's findings will be announced next December and the official results published during the third quarter in 2012.

The steering board at the central level will take responsibility forbuilding plans that will be submitted to the Planning and InvestmentMinister. Municipal governments will be responsible for carrying outtheir own surveys.

The census is conducted every five years by the General Statistics Office.

According to the 2006 census, Vietnam has 10.47 million housingunits participating in the agriculture and fishing sector, which is770,000 units less than in 2001./.