Viet Nam

Asia and the Pacific

Pathfinder aspiration since 2023 M-GA Roadmap in implementation

Viet Nam is addressing persistent challenges and gender inequalities by expanding decent and productive employment, reducing informality and building an inclusive, accessible and rights-based universal social protection system that is gender-responsive and resilient to shocks, and meets the needs of all people across the life cycle, thereby advancing a just transition in which no one is left behind.

Gender equality is a cross-cutting priority across employment and social protection policies, with the care economy providing an important pathway to create decent jobs, reduce and redistribute unpaid care responsibilities, strengthen women's economic participation, and respond to growing care needs arising from demographic change.

USD 700,000 Total funding (UN + World Bank) Drupal project portfolio
2 Projects 1 active · 1 completed
102,177,431 Population UN Population Division · 2026
71.3% Employment-to-population ratio Male 75.8% · Female 67.1% ILOSTAT — national data (ICLS 13) · 2024
1.5% Unemployment rate ILOSTAT — national data (ICLS 13) · 2024
38.3% Social protection coverage (SDG 1.3.1) ILOSTAT — SDG 1.3.1 · 2022

Implementing agencies

  • ILO
  • UNDP
  • UNICEF
  • UN Women
  • World Bank

The Global Accelerator uses ILOSTAT and UN data to provide internationally comparable data across the countries engaged, which is based on government data. To view the data from the government, click here.

Roadmap

Roadmap

Roadmap in implementation. Endorsed in 2026.

Governance

  • Co-chaired by Institute of State Organizational and Labour Sciences
  • Ministry of Home Affairs

Priorities

Decent jobs and labour market formalization

Universal inclusive and sustainable social protection

Skills for green digital and structural transitions

Inclusive and just transitions with gender equality and LNOB at the centre

Integrated governance and sustainable financing for jobs and social protection

Priority pilot sectors: digital economy and care economy

Two coffee farmers holding baskets of freshly picked coffee cherries in Viet Nam
ILO

Global Accelerator and M-GA highlights

  • On 24 November 2023, the Central Executive Committee of the Viet Nam Communist Party issued Party Resolution No 42-NQ/TW, which aimed at renovating and improving the quality of social policies in Viet Nam. At the same time, it also formalized the country’s commitment to become a pathfinder country of the initiative.
  • The revised Law on Social Insurance was adopted in 2024. Key reforms include expanding compulsory social insurance to previously uncovered groups, reducing the minimum contribution period for pension entitlement from 20 to 15 years, and strengthening linkages between contributory pensions and tax-financed social pensions, including lowering the eligibility age for social pensions from 80 to 75.
  • The Law on Social Insurance also strengthens maternity protection, including through a state-funded maternity allowance for eligible voluntary social insurance participants, while providing greater flexibility to progressively extend coverage to emerging and non-standard forms of employment.
  • The revised Law on Employment (Law No. 74/2025/QH15) was adopted in June 2025, strengthening the legal framework for employment support, labour market information, vocational skills development and unemployment insurance, and providing an important foundation for a more modern and inclusive labour market.
  • The new Law on Vocational Education and Training (Law No. 124/2025/QH15) was adopted in December 2025, further modernizing the TVET framework and supporting a more flexible and responsive skills system. The new framework includes innovations such as vocational upper-secondary qualifications and digital diplomas/certificates and provides a stronger basis for responding to changing labour-market and skills needs.
  • The national roadmap has been developed through a nationally-led, multi-stakeholder process, providing an integrated framework linking decent and productive employment, skills, social protection, just transitions and sustainable financing.
  • The Global Accelerator strengthened the evidence base for employment and social protection reforms. Gender-responsive and policy-oriented research undertaken on employment and social protection systems, youth access to green jobs, women's and men's participation in social insurance, and social protection for outdoor workers exposed to heatwaves, generated practical recommendations to inform the national roadmap and priority reforms.

What lies ahead?

  • Develop a new Social Assistance Law, providing an opportunity to strengthen the coverage, adequacy, coherence and rights-based foundations of Viet Nam's non-contributory social protection system.
  • Revise the Law on Support for Small and Medium-sized Enterprises, including opportunities to strengthen formalization and better connect enterprise development with employment, social insurance and productivity policies.
  • Revise the Law on Older Persons, including the introduction and progressive development of a national long-term care (LTC) system, responding to rapid population ageing and linking health, social care, workforce development and sustainable financing.
  • Translate the GA roadmap into implementation, strengthen integrated employment–social protection policies, sustainable financing, data and monitoring, partnerships and institutional coordination, with gender equality and leaving no one behind as cross-cutting priorities. The roadmap identifies modern labour markets, skills, multi-tiered social protection, inclusion/just transition, and sustainable financing and monitoring as core areas.

Projects

2 projects USD 700,000

Project Financing Status Budget

Partners

  • Government Ministry of Home Affairs, Ministry of Health, Ministry of Finance, Ministry of Education and Training
  • Research and Academia Viet Nam Academy of Social Science, National Economics University
  • Finance –
  • Development partners World Bank, DFAT, Irish Aid, ILO-Korea Partnership Programme

Latest news

Publications

Report cover page
Reports

Report: Asia Pacific Global Accelerator Policy Forum - Meeting the Commitments for Productive Employment and Universal Social Protection

See all publications