Fishing on Lake Albert is one of the main occupations in Ituri, which borders Uganda. (Photo: Representational/File)
Since the start of August, flash floods have caused widespread destruction in the provinces of Dien Bien, Yen Bai, Son La, Cao Bang and Lai Chau, the Hanoi-based disaster control office said in a statement.
Rising sea levels are also threatening the country's coastline and intruding salt water threatens its ability to grow and harvest crops.
Last year, around 235 people were reported dead and missing due to flooding and bad weather in Vietnam. Authorities estimated the losses at USD 1.7 billion.
Nearly 5,000 soldiers, police and residents have been mobilized to search for the missing. Vietnam is prone to floods and storms, which kill hundreds of people each year.
The region, among Vietnam's poorest, continued to receive heavy rainfall on Friday morning with as much as 81 mm in the previous 24 hours, bringing the total rainfall for the past four days to 321 mm, the committee said.
According to the Central Natural Disasters Committee, the floods destroyed 228 houses, damaged more than 130 hectares of rice paddies while landslides crippled much of the area's transportation infrastructure, with bridges and roads washed away.
Throughout the northwestern area more than 650 houses were destroyed and damaged, hundreds of hectares of crops lost and roads broken, authorities said.
According to witnesses in Yen Bai province, floods tore through villages on Thursday night, carrying with them large boulders from the mountains.
State media ran pictures of villages swamped by mud.