Vietnamese mangroves in the Mekong Delta have been degraded and lost by war, coastal development and
aquaculture since the 1950s. However, to promote replanting and support local livelihoods Ca Mau
province issued 20-year mangrove leases to local farmers in 1991 for 70:30 forest:exploitation, which was
later changed to 60:40 in 2010. Extensive integrated mangrove-shrimp systems were particularly attractive
to poor farmers and understanding their perceptions on factors affecting productivity as well as socioeconomic,
technical and financial characteristics can aid solutions to better management. Shrimp
productivity is variable and concern from the local producers that this could be because of age of mangrove
stands in the systems led to this study. Forty-six households were selected at random based on different
mangrove ages (2–4, 5–7, 9–12 and > 12 years old) in Lam Hai commune, Ca Mau province. The
structured questionnaires with both quantitative and qualitative methods, a participatory approach, principal
component analysis (PCA), and analytic hierarchy process (AHP) were employed to evaluate the effects of
mangrove ages on pond environment and shrimp productivity. The average farm area was 4.9 ± 1.9 ha,
with forest:exploitation ratio of 60:40. Mean shrimp productivity was 188.1 ± 94.7 kg ha−1 yr−1 and this
was not significantly different between the four ages of mangrove systems. High variable costs of pond
dredging meant the lowest profit margin was recorded in >12 years old mangrove stands but the highest
profit margin was found in 9–12 years. Water level management was identified as a key factor in stepwise
regression analysis. The farmers’ responses to the criteria for integrated mangrove-shrimp pond management
under different mangrove age systems differ and are discussed.