Form Submission: Participation Entry

Communities in Vietnam’s northern highlands increasingly pursue wage labor opportunities in the Red River Delta and abroad. My research focuses on the experience of this change in livelihood opportunities by two Tay ethnic minority communities living in the core and buffer zones of Ba Be National Park. Using ethnographic research, I explore how new movements of people and money shape decisions by individuals living in forest-dependent communities as well as the structure of forest landscapes. I argue that attempts to manage people and natural resources continues traditions of highland control projected from the lowlands while creating precarious life conditions due to debt-taking.