Hà Tĩnh together with neighbouring Nghệ An province the two provinces are together called "Nghệ Tĩnh", and the locals are known for speaking Vietnamese with a very noticeable regional accent.[5][6]
Geography
Hà Tĩnh is about 340 km (211 miles) south of Hanoi.
Climate
The climate is sub-tropical, with cooler temperatures in winter; Vietnam's highest ever temperature, 43.4 degrees Celsius (110 Fahrenheit), was recorded in the province in 2019.[7]
Administrative divisions
Map of Ha Tinh province in 1909
Hà Tĩnh is subdivided into 13 district-level sub-divisions:
Hà Tĩnh has 130 km (82 miles) of Highway 1A stretching from Bến Thủy Bridge (Vinh City) to Đèo Ngang Pass linking Hà Tĩnh and Quảng Bình. The Ho Chi Minh Route is the second most important route of the province. Hà Tĩnh also contains Road 8 which runs from Hồng Lĩnh town to Laos and the Viet-Lao highway from Vũng Áng Harbour (Kỳ Anh District) to Laos. In 2007, a railway link to Laos was proposed from Hà Tĩnh province.
Economy
Agriculture, forestry and fishery takes up 35.5 percent of total GDP and the province's GDP accounts for 0.7 percent of Vietnam's GDP. Hà Tĩnh has taken slow steps in economic reforms though better signs in recent times are incentive. Vũng Áng harbour with some plants, factories and a thermal power station is becoming the most active economic hub. Vietnam Steel operates an iron mine in Thạch Khê District,[8] with reserves of 544 million tonnes of iron, which is one of the largest mines in southeast Asia.[9]
A US$10 billion iron and steel plant was built in Vũng Áng in the 2010s (see Formosa Ha Tinh Steel Corporation). The steel plant is part of an industrial park, which is estimated to cost more than US$20 billion. When finished in 2020, the industrial park will have a port, a 2,100-MW power plant and a steel plant with six blast furnaces.[10] In 2016, the Formosa Steel plant released untreated waste water with heavy metals and other toxins into the nearby sea, which caused the 2016 Vietnam marine life disaster.[11]
History
Drawing of Hà Tĩnh citadel in the Nguyễn dynastyDrawing of Hà Thanh citadel in the Nguyễn dynasty
In chữ Hán, the province's name is written as 河靜, meaning "quiet river". Beginning in 1930 Hà Tĩnh, along with Nghệ An and Quảng Ngãi, was one of the early grounds for the Vietnamese rural Soviet movement and protests.[12][13]
^Thê ́Anh Nguyêñ, Alain Forest Guerre et paix en Asie du Sud-Est Page 110 1998 " ... the regional way of speaking in the southern part of Thanh Nghệ, the so-called Nghệ Tĩnh (Nghệ An and Hà Tĩnh) dialect, ..."
^Jonathan D. London Education in Vietnam 2011 Page 186 "A teacher from Hà Tĩnh province acknowledged this issue, quipping that his distinctive and “heavy” Hà Tĩnh accent would be tough even for most Việt teachers, let alone students."
^Patricia M. Pelley Postcolonial Vietnam: New Histories of the National Past 2002 Page 196 "In September 1930, the first Vietnamese soviet (in the village of vi:Võ Liệt) was formed, and soon it encompassed the three provinces of Nghệ An, Hà Tĩnh, and Quảng Ngãi. By this point, a number of Vietnamese students were already attending ..."
^Nguyen Công LuanNationalist in the Viet Nam Wars: Memoirs of a Victim Turned Soldier 2011 "... "Soviet" style that led farmers from several villages in Nghệ An and Hà Tĩnh provinces to stage mass protests for months after May 1930"
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