Definition And Context

It is an acronym that stands for:

Vuon (garden)
Ao (fish pond)
Chuong (animal sheds)
Its a set of ancestral techniques used by Vietnamese for farming.
I heard of the term while I was researching about an upcoming leisure trip to Vietnam.
I was wondering if there are permaculture sites I could visit there. Then I stumbled on this
conference paper where I saw VAC mentioned for the first time:
http://permaculturewest.org.au/ipc6/ch06/vanman/index.html
So I set myself to try to investigate VAC during my trip to Vietnam. Here is my humble report.
VAC in Vietnam
After seeing so many houses with pond, garden and live stock when driving through villages you
could think that everyone is doing VAC. However although it is really popular in North Vietnam, not
everyone is doing proper VAC.
Many villagers are shop-keepers or other small businesses and VAC represent for them a side
activity. Their homesteads surface is usually smaller than the farms who do full VAC and they are
not able to live of their system. Ive been able to visit two of these full VAC practicing farms.
The other significant learning I made was that VAC is taught to grade 7 in schools as part of the
normal curriculum.
The basics
The typical VAC site looks like the diagram below.

I have seen the biogas system in only one site which was the biggest one. That site had a pigs pen of
20-30 pigs. I wonder if one needs a minimum number of animals to make biogas worthwhile.
Examples

At this homestead, we could see medicinal plants growing near the main house.

It had two ponds, one for fishes and one for turtles.
The fish pond was large (swimming pool size). The turtle pond had a recess to allow the turtles to lay
their eggs.
The turtles are the surplus that the family sells at the markets.

We visited that house.

They had a very large pond (stadium size) and a large pig hens.
They generate biogas from the pig and use water based plants to feed the geese and make the food
for the pig.
However for the feeding pig, they supplement it with commercially purchased food. Pigs and fishes
are the surplus they sell to markets.

In our hosts home there wasnt a pond but a large garden of fruit trees and lettuce. The dog kennel
and chicken hens were side by side and together generated a lot of heat. So the airing area for
drying clothes, the dry storage for food, and the open fire cooker were all around them (Vietnam has
a very humid climate in February). My host doesnt pretend using VAC, they still need to buy some
food.

In all the sites weve visited and also in the backyard gardens of villagers they use banana trees as
hedge and they do use asphalt road as a strategy for their water systems. For example by growing
lettuce on the lower side of the road and let gravity guide rain water toward the edibles before
ending in the stream. They also practice composting and the policy of the minimum distance
between were garbage is created and where its stowed away.

Because the primary objective of my trip was something else and because almost no Vietnamese Ive
met can or are willing to converse in English (I cant speak Vietnamese), I couldnt get much deeper
in understanding the design principles, the practical considerations and the problems faced and
solved nor could I have time to explore more houses.
In particular, I wish I could see how the (underground) bio digester works or know whether chickens
element have interaction with other animals or plants.
Furthermore, Vietnam is the second larger exporter of rice and it is easy to guess when travelling
through the countryside.
There must be positive some beneficial interactions between the rice fields and the VAC systems, but

I couldnt figure out any (the cows in the rice field, they must be up to something, and what happen
to the rice husk?).
Also I would like to see the differences between regions in Vietnam, and also to find out whether
VAC has been used to regenerate the lands damaged by the wars and how it is used to improve selfreliance and resiliency of impoverished communities.
Im hopping I can visit again.
Rija