Stunning: Sujan Sarkar's photo Paddy Cultivation (left) won the Grand Prize at the 2015 CGAP Photo Contest, while the photo Overcoming the Sand Hill (right) by Le Minh Quoc of Viet Nam won the East Asia and Pacific Region prize.

HCM CITY (VNS) — Five Vietnamese photographers won regional and special mention prizes at the 2015 Consultative Group to Assist the Poor photo contest, according to results reported on the website www.cgap.org.

The photo of Le Minh Quoc of Viet Nam, Overcoming Sandhill, won the East Asia and Pacific Region prize.

The grand prize winner was Sujan Sarkar of India, for the photo Paddy Cultivation, which showed workers in a paddy field in West Bengal, India. It was chosen from more than 3,300 entries from 77 countries.

The photo of Liming Cao of China, Fishing with a Net, won second place and the third place prize was awarded to Pranab Basak of India for the photo Hands for Freedom.

The People's Choice Award went to Vikash Singh of India's photo Farming Lady.

The judges selected 10 thematic and regional winners and 14 special mentions, including five winners from Viet Nam. Four of the five won special mention and Quoc won the regional award.

The contest invited submissions in four key areas: digital financial services and mobile banking; women's use of financial services; microfinance for small business enterprises; and smallholder farmers and their families.

The Consultative Group to Assist the Poor is a global partnership of 34 leading organisations that seeks to advance financial inclusion. —VNS