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In 1995, the forest coverage area in Vietnam was 27.2%, but by 2019, it reached to 41.89%. The Government claims that the fast-growing forest coverage is highly contributing to GDP. However, recent studies reveal that the economic growth rate of ethnic minorities in the forest area is very slow. Some studies have been conducted on the Government’s efforts to reforest over the years. However, very few studies have carried on (de)forestation in Vietnam from the perspective of political ecology. The present article co-relates (de)forestation in Vietnam with ecosystems, socio-economic status, and politics. The paper presents the study in four broad sections. The first segment explores the current situation of forests in Vietnam. In the second part, the paper discusses the impacts of (de)forestation on the ecosystem. Thirdly, the article analyses impact of (de)forestation on the socio-economic development of Vietnamese citizens. Finally, the paper discusses the conclusions approaching from the perspective of the Government and citizens, before turning to the end, it proposes some policy-recommendations for public and private stakeholders to promote and protect the forestry sector in Vietnam.

In the history of Vietnam’s establishment and development, agriculture has always been an important economic sector. In 2019, the agriculture, forestry, and fishery sectors accounted for 13.96% of Vietnam’s GDP. However, this is also the year that witnessed the GDP growth of the agriculture sector plummeted to only 2.2 percent. There are many factors responsible for the decline in the share of agriculture in economic growth, while other sectors have increased. In the current context, with the outstanding development of science and technology, global networking and information society, every aspect of development including agriculture development cannot be separated from the operation of media, especially online media. This paper analyses the role of online media in agriculture development in Vietnam by analyzing hundreds of articles published in different electronic newspapers. The paper particularly examines 217 news-articles produced on VnExpress, the most read Vietnamese newspaper. While discussing the advantages and disadvantages of the role of media in agriculture development, the paper also explores some new paradigm and recommends to enhance the role of online media for digitizing the development of agriculture in Vietnam in this digital age.