In the past decade, Vietnam has achieved an impressive rate of socioeconomic development paralleled by broad improvements in the health sector – but child malnutrition still lags far behind that of most other health indicators. The purpose of this study is to discover inequality in the near-present situation (1997–98; hereafter referred to as the present situation), changes of child malnutrition over the period from 1992–93 to 1997–98, and factors that might affect the inability to rapidly reduce child malnutrition among the poor, rural, and minority populations.