Forests in Lamdong is the areas for preservation and conservation of valuable rare florae and faunae, and of aquatic environment sources of the headstream of the main seven river systems. The biological diversity of this ecological system plays an important role in the landscape. Beside the scenic rivers, springs, waterfalls, and dams, Lamdong has formed up a group of attractive sites like the pine forests surrounding Dalat, the tourist areas of Tuyen lam Lake, Suoivang-Dankia Lake, Valley D’Amour; Datanla waterfall, Prenn , Pongour, Dambri, and Mount Langbian, etc.

Developed in the Lamvien plateau at an altitude of 1500 meter, Dalat is of a rare site of the South-East Asia, having temperate climate of coolness throughout the year in the tropics, and not far from populated centers and big cities of the region. Ranked as one of the top tourist centers of Vietnam, Dalat is well-known as an ideal center of tourism and health rehabilitation; and also for its all-year-round flowers of thousands of variant categories, e.g. those from temperate climate areas, and particularly orchids.

There are various types of tourism in Lamdong-Dalat, including sight-seeing jaunt, health rehabilitation; tours for cultural experiencing, sports, or ecological purposes, etc.; and excursion to forests and gardens, etc. Dalat has an 18-hole golf-course of international standards, and a system of hotels and resorts of 20,000 guest-per-day capacity, including 20 one to five-star hotels. There are requirements for more luxury hotels with various services.

The province is inviting investment in the building of an international-standard clinic, which would facilitate a new type of tourism for health rehabilitation.

Both Tuyenlam and Dankia - Suoi Vang Resort are already planned for local and/or foreign investment. Investors now can even rent forest land for development of ecological tourism and forest excursion, as per Decision No. 118/QD-UB dated 16 November 2001 issued by the People’s Committee of the province.

With proper investment, the tourism industry of Lamdong-Dalat will be further developed.

AGRICULTURE AND FORESTRY

Beside favourable climate, the Lamdong soil is quite suitable for cultivation of long-term industrial crops e.g. tea, coffee, mulberry, vegetables and flowers, etc. Lamdong has established many specialized areas, being the potential sources of raw materials for the food and foodstuff processing industry.

The province is having 119,000 hectares of coffee plantation of the total capacity of 111,000 MTs of kernels, especially the Arabica coffee from Dalat, Lamha, and Ductrong is of high appreciation of quality by foreign experts. The province’s policy is to maintain and stabilize the existing coffee plantation areas and to have focus on intensive farming to ensure high productivity and high quality of coffee beans. Areas requiring more development include the after-harvest preliminary processing and preservation, and units of processing final products of coffee.

Lamdong is the only province in the Southern part of the country suitable for tea plantation. After more than 70 years of development, Lamdong tea has become an important commodity production for export. The province has the largest acreage of tea plantation, accounting for 30% of the total tea areas of the country, and with higher productivity than the average level of the country. At present , Lamdong has approximately 25,000 hectares, yielding about 135,000 MTs of tea buds, with scopes to expand up to 28,000 hectares, also suitable to tea types from Taiwan , China and Japan, etc. Tea from Lamdong has been exported to many countries in the world, chiefly in the Middle East, East Europe, Asia and the Pacific.

The climate of Lamdong, especially of Baoloc District, is favourable to raising hermaphrodite silkworms all year round. The province has about 6,778 hectares of mulberry of average capacity of 6.8 MTs mulberry leaves/ha and 2,618 MTs. cocoons/ha. The production of silk products has been intensively invested , but still requires much more investment.

Other industrial crops include cashew nuts with a capacity of 2,300 TPY from the area of 7,300 hectares which can be further extended to 8,300 hectares.

Also thanks to favourable climate conditions, high quality vegetables can easily develop all the year. The total area of vegetables is more than 23,783 ha., chiefly in Dalat, Ductrong, Lacduong, Donduong, and Lamha, yielding a capacity of 554,000 TPY. Methods of bio-clean vegetable production has been popularly applicable , and there are requirements for investments to seeds, modern production technology and vegetable processing.

Main areas for flower planting are Dalat, Donduong, and Ductrong. Flowers from Lamdong are of diversifying types and high value like orchids, roses, carnations, lilies, gladioli, and madonna lilies, etc. Seeds have been regularly upgraded or newly imported to ensure high output at an annual average of 70,000,000 of flowers. Lamdong flowers have been exported to markets of Japan, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Singapore, Malaysia, and New Zealand, etc. Some investors have earned profit from investment in flower planting, attracting the attention of other investors in this field.

Lamdong also takes advantage from the favourable climate to develop its milch cow raising with its target of 6,000 of milch cows by end of 2010, yielding an output of 12,420 MTs of fresh milk for supply of materials to milk factories.

The 617,000 hectares of forests at Lamdong consist of mostly special-use and protective forests, covering 63% of the total area of the province. There are abundant sources of bamboo and other bamboo types like neohouzeaua at the southern districts of Dahuoai, Dateh, and Cattien, with very fast re-generation process thanks to much rain, high moisture, and suitable soil. These are sufficient to meet the requirement of raw materials for the manufacturing of about 50,000 MTs of paperpulp per year.

MINING

As per researches, Lamdong is having 25 categories of minerals, of which bauxite, bentonite, kaolin, diatomite and peat are at industrial exploitation reserve rate.

Bauxite ores at Lamdong is at 1,234 million metric tons of good quality contents, e.g. 44 – 45% Al2O3, 22.7 – 23.6% Fe2O3, 2.1% Si2O3, and 3.7% TiO2.; with convenient conditions of exploitation and transportation. Other minerals include kaolin at 520 million metric tons of reserve, suitable for manufacturing porcelain items for electronic industry, high-quality ceramic household items, other thermo-tolerant porcelain items and refractory bricks, inactive ingredients for paper manufacturing and alumina sulfate manufacturing.; bentonite reserve at 4 million metric tons of very high quality, through the process of activation with soda to become alkalined quite suitable for moulding or casting industry, manufacturing of bleaching agents in various industries of lubricants, food and foodstuff, synthetic fertilizers, and items used for petroleum drilling as per ASTM and European standards; and lignite and diatomite found at many places with Dailao Ore at Baoloc having industrial exploitation reserve of 8.5 million cbm, for manufacturing fuel (at 2172 – 5327 kcal/kg) , insulator and additives in manufacturing cement or fertilizers.

INDUSTRIAL ZONES

On the basis of potentialities of raw materials and as oriented to develop the processing industry of agriculture, forestry and mineral commodities and products, cosummer’s goods and tourist services, Lamdong has established two industrial zones at Phuhoi-Ductrong and Locson-Baoloc to facilitate domestic and foreign iunvestors.

Phuhoi Industrial Zone is located at Ductrong District with a total area of 190 hectares, at a convenient site regarding infrastructure , communications, and distance from areas of raw material sources. It is 35 km north-eastwards from Dalat and 270 km south-westward from Hochiminh City, attracting the focused investment projects on production of tourist items, food and foodstuff processing, forestry processing, manufacturing of construction materials and chemicals, metallurgy and paper industry.

Locson Industrial Zone is located at Baoloc Town with a total area of 185 hectares, 120km north-eastwards from Dalat and 200km south-weatwards from Hochiminh City, in the center of industrial crops, grain crops, and mining, attracting the focused investment projects on mineral processing, construction material manufacturing, food and foodstuff processing, textiles, engineering, electronics, chemical, and paper manufacturing, etc.

FOREIGN DIRECT INVESTMENT

Lamdong has received 55 FDI projects from businesses from 11 countries and territories, mostly from Taiwan, Japan, and Singapore, with a total registered capital of over USD883,000,000.00, of which 45 projects have been operating , accounting for USD107,000,000.00 value of implimentation and execution. These FDI projects have contributed to the transfer of the economic structures, increase of GDP, contribution to the budgets, and provisions of more jobs for local people.

DOMESTIC INVESTMENT

Local businesses operating in Lamdong have made important contribution to the expediting of the development of the local economy. Lamdong is having 41 state enterprises, 984 private businesses, 94 trade co-operatives, and 16,505 units of family businesses, with a total registered capital of 1,594.5 billion VND. The activities of these businesses have demonstrated the significance of sources domestic investment capiltal, contributing to the increase of GDP, performance of contribution to state budgets, and help provide jobs to local people. Many investors from other provinces have found opportunities here and made investment to then achieved profits from Lamdong, the province still offering many more opportunities for investors.

IMPORT-EXPORT TURNOVER (Statistics of 2002)

Export : USD41,000,000.00, for principal items like spun silk yarn, silk cloth, tea, coffee, cashew nuts, fresh vegetables, dried vegetables, garments, knit-wears, and votive paper, etc.

Import: USD15,000,000.00, for principal items like yarn, raw silk yarn, machinery and equipment, and flower seeds, etc.