10 Đồng FAO

Issued the year before the fall of Saigon, this coin was part of the FAO's global campaign to promote food production and agricultural awareness through circulating coinage — a program that recruited dozens of nations throughout the 1970s. South Vietnam's participation was largely nominal; by 1974 the economy was in severe distress following the Paris Peace Accords and the withdrawal of American financial support, and brass-plated steel had replaced the earlier aluminum-bronze issues as a cost-cutting measure. The National Bank would cease to exist within sixteen months of this coin's minting.