According to the 2009 Vietnamese Population Census, 6.6 million people migrated within
Vietnam over the period 2004-2009 (United Nations Viet Nam, 2010), an increase of 46%
with respect to the number of internal migrants recorded in the 1999 Census. The 2004
VHLSS survey unveils that almost 89% of households with a migrant receive remittances,
which constitute a substantial means by which households can pay daily expenses such as
education or health care expenses.
The aim of this paper is to provide an overview of the characteristics of migrant households
and analyse the effects of migration in Vietnam, on the basis of the VARHS survey
conducted in 2012. The economics literature has extensively explored the determinants of
migration. The seminal paper by Harris and Todaro (1970) modelled the rural to urban
migration decision. According to their theory, the main determinant of migration is the
expected wage differential between the origin place of residence and the destination. Later
contributions to the literature analysed other factors besides wage differentials and introduced
income uncertainty and relative deprivation as further determinants of the migration decision
(Stark, 1991). The new economics of migration modelled the migration decision as a risksharing
decision, whereby households can diversify risk by letting a member migrate to
another labour market, with the aim of reducing the income risk facing households1
.
In this paper, we will discuss differences across migrant households on the basis of reasons
for migrating and we will explore the features of migrants and migrant households. We will
also examine the households that receive remittances and how they are used. Finally, we will
uncover the role of migration and remittances as shock-coping mechanisms in rural Vietnam.
This paper is organized as follows. Section 2 provides a policy background on migration
directives in Vietnam. Section 3 describes the data, while Section 4 compares migrant versus
non-migrant households. Section 5 discusses the characteristics of migrants, while remittance
behaviour is explored in Section 6. Section 7 presents the results of the econometric
investigation of the role of migration as a risk-coping mechanism. Section 8 concludes.