The paper aims to critically review the current management of mangrove forests allocated to local communities for protecting and using mangrove forests for livelihoods in the Mekong Delta of Vietnam, and to outline a prospective model guidelines. Allocated mangrove forests were severely eroded. Private coastal lands have been intensively used for agriculture or aquaculture. Allocated mangroves and private lands need to be sustainably managed, especially to adapt to projected sea level rise in the region. The review revealed that allocated mangrove forests were poorly managed without technical guidelines on configuring allocated mangrove forests in many coastal provinces the Mekong Delta. The Kien Giang communities have recently established a future management step with developing model guidelines on configuring mangrove areas at the 30/70 ratio. The model guidelines are expected to overcome some of the challenges to the current management of allocated mangroves in Kien Giang and the Mekong Delta, but first testing in the local circumstance in Kien Giang for effectiveness and efficiency prior to wider application and policy change.
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