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Author: Vietnam aujourd'hui Rising labor costs and tensions with China have sent companies looking for labor in Vietnam, but Hanoi has its own set of serious problems. Vietnam is viewed as a viable alternative to China for foreign (particularly U.S.) companies seeking to establish or increase their lower-cost manufacturing capacity. This is due to the increasing costs of labor in China; rising Chinese taxes on foreign enterprises; difficulties with the business environment in China; and the perception among some U.S. firms that the political risk of doing business in China may increase due to rising U.S.-Chinese trade tensions. However, over the long term, foreign firms seeking to expand their operations in Vietnam may discover that the Vietnamese workforce lacks crucial skills, due to problems with its education system. Working-Age Population Surge The workforce in Vietnam (defined as adults aged 23 to 65) is expected to jump by 23 million over the next 20 years, to 65 million. This should help make the country a viable alternative to China as a manufacturing center--if Hanoi can reduce the corruption and incompetence that plague its primary and secondary schools. Tertiary education in Vietnam also has problems, particularly in the quality of its science and engineering instruction. Skills Shortage A recent employer survey by Vietnam's Ministry of Labour, Invalids and Social Affairs found that just 40% of the workforce had training of any sort. The majority of respondents experienced difficulty in finding workers with skills to match their needs. Among workers in their early twenties, nearly 80% had no formal job training before joining the workforce. Education System Shortcomings Approximately 40% of Vietnam's population is of school age or younger (under 23). Yet the school system's problems are acute: --Inadequate class time. An recent analysis by U.K. research group Young Lives, An International Study of Childhood Poverty, highlighted the fact that the Vietnamese school year is just 33 weeks and only 20% of children receive the international norm of at least five to six hours of class time per day. These figures are both significantly worse in rural areas, where children must help their families with agricultural work. --Out-of-pocket cost. In 1991 Vietnam made primary school education compulsory and free. However, its cost recovery policy initiated in 1992 shifted the cost burden from the government to the consumer for subsequent education: junior secondary school, senior secondary school and technical/vocational training school. The emergence of a middle class in Vietnam with sufficient means to fund rising education costs is hiding structural deficiencies in the system. Children of families with lesser means are sometimes forced to forgo secondary education entirely. Again, the problem is particularly severe in rural areas. --Low teacher pay. Low teacher pay has led to situations where educators have pressured students to participate in additional study activities in order to augment their meager official salaries. The practice was so pervasive that National Decree 242, approved in 1993, included regulations limiting "extra classes." Only authorized teachers are now allowed to provide such classes, and primary school students may undertake no more than two extra lessons totaling four hours per week. Outlook The education system's shortcomings have created significant challenges for foreign investors seeking to recruit and retain prospective Vietnamese employees. Not only should they expect to incur significant costs for training and development programs, they will also likely need to adopt creative methods to retain these employees once they are skilled and competent. Also, as witnessed in India during that country's services outsourcing boom, local labor markets will heat up as the economy grows. This will increase demand for the relatively limited pool of skilled workers, and boost employee turnover as employers engage in a bidding war for staff. By Oxford Analytica - Forbes.com - March 15, 2010 Vietnam releases leading dissident from prison Author: Vietnam aujourd'hui HANOI — Vietnam released one of its leading democracy activists from prison Monday after the dissident Catholic priest spent three years and suffered two strokes in solitary confinement, his lawyer and sister said. Authorities released Father Nguyen Van Ly from a prison near Hanoi at 4 a.m. and drove him in an ambulance back to his hometown of Hue, his sister, Nguyen Thi Hieu, told The Associated Press. "I'm very glad to see him out of prison and pleased to see that he is in better health than he was when I last saw him," Hieu said. In 2007, Father Ly was sentenced to 8 years in prison for disseminating anti-government propaganda during a dramatic trial in which police muzzled him for shouting anti-communist slogans and accusing Vietnamese officials of practicing "the law of the jungle." Father Ly is one of Vietnam's best-known human rights activists and has spent more than 15 years in prison since 1977, according to Freedom Now, a Washington-based law firm that serves as Ly's international counsel. "We're beyond delighted that Father Ly has been released," said Maran Turner, Freedom Now's executive director. "But Vietnam still has many human rights challenges. The government is still imprisoning many other activists." In recent months, Vietnam has sent 16 democracy activists to jail in one of its harsher crackdowns on dissent. Some observers have speculated that the crackdown is part of political jockeying ahead of next year's Communist Party congress. Turner said she was not sure why the government had decided to release Ly now. "It's hard to understand what moves governments to finally do the right thing," she said. "This has been a long time coming." Vietnamese government officials could not immediately be reached for comment. Officials at the U.S. embassy, which has pressed for Ly's release, said they had seen reports that Ly was paroled so that he could seek medical treatment. "If those reports are true, it would be a welcome humanitarian gesture," said David Moyer, an embassy spokesman. "We don't yet have any specific information about the conditions of his release." Father Ly is partly paralyzed on the right side of his body but can walk with a cane, according to his sister, who said he is staying at the Archdiocese of Hue, where priests planned to call doctors to assess his health. He suffered strokes in July and November and for a time was unable to walk, Turner said. Before his release, he received treatment in a Hanoi hospital, where he was watched by five guards, she said. In July, 37 U.S. senators sent a letter to President Nguyen Minh Triet calling for Ly's release. The Associated Press - March 15, 2010 Vietnam asks National Geographic to fix mapping error Author: Vietnam aujourd'hui Vietnam on Saturday said the US National Geographic Society was wrong in publishing a world map that shows the Hoang Sa (Paracel) Islands as belonging to China. t’s wrong to put the note “Paracel Is. China” to refer to Vietnam’s Hoang Sa archipelago in the map, Foreign Ministry Spokesperson Nguyen Phuong Nga said. “We request the National Geographic correct this mistake,” she said. “Vietnam has indisputable sovereignty over Hoang Sa (Paracel) and Truong Sa (Spratly) archipelagoes,” Nga stressed. Dr. Duong Danh Huy, an East Sea researcher, said: “I think this is a mistake, because the National Geographic Society is usually impartial.” However, the mistake needs to be criticized as the National Geographic Society is supposed to stay neutral and not take sides in a sovereignty dispute, he added. Huy said although general maps such as those published by the National Geographic Society do not have any legal value, they can have an impact on public perception. Thanh Nien / Vietnam News Agency - March 15, 2010 Striking Vietnam workers trickle back as company gives in Author: Vietnam aujourd'hui Four hundred striking workers at a South Korean-owned garment factory returned to their jobs Friday in Vietnam after the company accepted most of their demands, but another 400 continued to hold out for back pay. he strike was taking place as factories in southern Vietnam are facing severe labour shortages. All 800 workers staged a wildcat strike beginning March 3, said Cao Thi Hoang Tho, an officer at Bando Vina Ltd in the southern Vietnamese province of Tay Ninh. "Every day, they demonstrated in front of the factory for about an hour, so we negotiated with them," Tho said. "We have fulfilled almost all of their demands, except payment for the days they were on strike." The company agreed to hike salaries by 10 percent on March 5, as well as increasing other allowances. On Wednesday, the company issued an ultimatum that workers who had not returned to their jobs on Thursday would be fired. In fact, no workers returned at that time, but the 400 who turned up Friday morning were allowed to return to work. "Some of the workers continued to demonstrate at the factory gate this morning," Tho said. "We invited them to come in and talk, but if they don't agree, we will terminate them in accordance with the Labour Code." Under Vietnamese law, strikes must be approved by local authorities and the government-affiliated national trade union. In practice, virtually all strikes take place without such approval. The strike was the sixth in Tay Ninh so far this year, according to Vuong Van Lai, vice chair of the trade union's provincial branch. Striking workers might be taking advantage of widespread labour shortages to negotiate better deals. Labour officials in industrial provinces in southern Vietnam said they are short tens of thousands of workers as many have failed to return to work from the Lunar New Year's holidays in February. Migrant workers often find better-paying or more convenient jobs near their home villages after the holidays. According to Vietnam's Ministry of Labour, Invalids and Social Affairs, strikes in Vietnam fell nearly 70 percent in 2009 from 2008. There were 216 strikes last year, compared with 650 in 2008, and 151 of them involved companies in the textile and garment sectors that have foreign investors. Deutsche Presse Agentur _ March 15 29 on trial in Vietnam for drug trafficking and police corruption Author: Vietnam aujourd'hui A trial of 29 people who include former police officers and judges accused of being involved in a massive heroin trafficking and corruption case began in northern Vietnam, a court official said Friday. Nguyen Van Hoa, an official at the People's Court in Thai Nguyen province, said the trial, which started Wednesday, was the largest drug-trafficking case ever seen in the province and was expected to last more than two weeks. The accused included 21 people charged with trafficking 18 kilograms of heroin from 2004 to 2006, Hoa said. The group centered around former Hanoi policeman Nguyen Van Dua, 43. The eight other defendants are former policemen, court officials and judges accused of accepting bribes to allow Dua and his accomplices to escape sentencing in 2006 when the case first went to trial. All the accused were acquitted at that time. According to the newspaper Phap Luat, Dua, then a policeman in Hanoi, was originally arrested in 2006 for corruption in a different drug case. The mother of a convicted drug trafficker accused him of accepting bribes in exchange for a promise to help her son avoid the death penalty. When her son was executed anyway, the mother turned Dua in. While arresting Dua, police found packages of heroin at his home and uncovered his involvement in the drug-trafficking ring in Thai Nguyen. If convicted, Dua could face the death penalty. Deutsche Presse Agentur - March 15, 2010 Vietnam Airlines opposes VietJet Air's share sale Author: Vietnam aujourd'hui Vietnam Airlines (VNA) has recently sent a petition to prime minister opposing the investment cooperation (under any ways) between cheap air carrier-Air Asia (Malaysia) and VietJet Air Aviation Joint Stock Co (VJA) to establish VietJet AirAsia-a cheap aviation carrier. The above petition was sent after VJA sold 30 percent stake to AirAsia. In the document sent to prime minister, VNA said that allowing cheap air carriers massively joining Vietnam market and seeking way to buy domestic "trade marks" cheaply will be likely to cause serious impacts on the existence and development of Vietnam's newly established aviation firms. Talking with Tuoi Tre (youth) newspaper, Nguyen Duc Tam, VJA's general director said that till date, AirAsia has finalised all procedures to buy shares into VJA. Tam affirmed that "VJA having foreign shareholder is completely suitable with Vietnam's law. With the holding of 30 percent stake, AirAsia plays only role as a shareholder in the local firm. The company's all strategic decisions will be decided by the director board under the majority principle". Tuoi Tre - March 13, 2010 Vietnam, foreign firms to build $1 bln gas pipeline Author: Vietnam aujourd'hui HANOI, - Petrovietnam Gas has signed a deal with Chevron Corp , Japan's Mitsui Oil Exploration Co and Thailand's PTT Exploration and Production PTTE.BK to build a $1 billion gas pipeline in southern Vietnam. Petrovietnam Gas, run by state oil and gas group Petrovietnam, will hold a 51 percent stake under the business cooperation contract signed in Hanoi on Thursday, the corporation said in a statement. The three foreign firms would hold the remaining combined 49 percent, it said without giving investment breakdowns. The 400-km (248-mile) pipeline, 246 km of which will be under the sea, will transport 6.4 billion cubic metres of natural gas annually from blocks B, 48/95 and 52/97 in Vietnam's southwestern waters to power plants in Can Tho city's O Mon complex. The gas would also be distributed to the gas, electricity and urea complex in the southern province of Ca Mau, the statement said. Petrovietnam Gas said each year it supplies material to generate 40 percent of Vietnam's electricity, 35 percent of urea production needs, 10 percent of petrol consumption and nearly 70 percent of the country's liquefied petroleum gas. By Ho Binh Minh - Reuters - March 12, 2010 For Vietnam man on death row even donating body may be illegal Author: Vietnam aujourd'hui A murderer awaiting execution in Vietnam has applied to donate his body to science, but authorities said Wednesday they may not be able to fulfil his wish due to legal uncertainties. Fisherman Nguyen Van Hai, 30, pleaded guilty to killing a man and stealing his boat in August 2008. He is on death row in his home province of Quang Ninh, 100 kilometres east of Hanoi. A police official at the jail where Hai is being held, who declined to be identified, said Hai had written a letter to President Nguyen Minh Triet, which he gave to prison authorities. "This is the first such case in our detention centre, so our leaders sent his request to the central level for approval," the police official said. "I have been found guilty, so I want to be executed and to donate my body to science, to help people suffering from illness," Hai wrote, according to the newspaper Phap Luat Ho Chi Minh City. The newspaper quoted police Colonel Le Duy Tan, director of the detention centre, as saying he had no knowledge of any legal document stipulating that executed prisoners could donate their bodies to science or medicine. Article 5 of Vietnam's Law on Body and Organ Donation, passed in 2006, states that people 18 years or older "possessing full civil rights" have the right to donate organs and body parts. It is not clear whether prisoners also have such a right. Deutsche Presse Agentur - March 12, 2010 Vietnam officially allows some couples to have third child Author: Vietnam aujourd'hui Vietnam has officially allowed exceptions to its longstanding two-child policy under certain circumstances, a government official confirmed Wednesday. A new decree details seven scenarios in which couples are to have the right to a third child, Nguyen Thi Thanh Huong, director of the Hanoi Population Department, said. Parents who already have one child and are taken over the two-child limit by twins or triplets in the second pregnancy, will not be considered to have violated the policy. Couples with children from prior marriages or with disabled or deceased children, and members of ethnic minorities numbering fewer than 10,000 people are also to be allowed to have a third child. Finally, mothers with two children out of wedlock are authorized to have a third if they get married. "This is the first time the government has given out detailed guidance on who can have a third baby," Huong said. As a practical matter, Vietnam's population policies have long been flexible. Since signing on to international agreements in 2003 that protect the reproductive rights of parents, the government has "encouraged" two-child families rather than mandating them legally. Even when the policy was more stringent, violations were generally punished only with subtle administrative measures. Parents who worked in state-owned enterprises might find themselves denied promotion, for example. According to the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA), Vietnam's birth rate has been declining naturally due to rising use of contraceptives and the tendency to have fewer children as income levels rise. Total fertility stood at 2.09 children per woman in 2008, slightly below the replacement rate. The 2008 figures showed 16.9 per cent of Vietnamese women had more than two children. "In the public domain there's very little reference to the two-child policy anymore," said Bruce Campbell, UNFPA's representative in Hanoi. "There's more reference to the 'small-family norm'." Campbell said that Vietnam's birthrate would likely follow the pattern of other East Asian countries, like Japan and South Korea, which have seen fertility plunge far below the replacement rate as prosperity grew. He anticipated that Vietnamese policies might even switch from discouraging to promoting higher birthrates in future, to avoid the struggle of supporting the retiree population with a shrinking labour force, as has been seen elsewhere. The narrow criteria of new regulations apply to too few couples to lead to a significant difference in the birthrate, Campbell said. The two-child policy was initially introduced to counter a baby boom after the end of the Vietnam War in 1975. At the time, the country faced food shortages, and the effort to hold down the population was considered a government policy success in the 1980s. In recent years the more pressing population problem has become a disparity in gender ratios. According to Vietnam's Ministry of Health, there are currently 112 boys born for every 100 girls. Some critics have said that the two-child policy, combined with the strong preference for sons in Vietnam's Confucian culture, leads parents to abort female foetuses. Other East Asian countries with no official family-size policies, including South Korea, have faced even sharper gender imbalances at similar stages of development. Vietnam's population of 86 million makes it the 13th-most-populous country in the world. Deutsche Presse Agentur - March 10, 2010 Work to start on Vietnam section of transnational road Author: Vietnam aujourd'hui Construction of the 220km Vietnamese segment of a transnational highway linking the Greater Mekong Subregion (GMS) will begin in the second quarter of the year, says Duong Tuan Minh, general director of the My Thuan Project Management Unit. The 1,000-km highway will run from Bangkok City in Thailand, pass the border town of Kok Kong Town and Sihanoukville City in Cambodia and reach the Vietnamese border town of Ha Tien in Kien Giang Province before ending at Ca Mau Province, where it meets the country's National Highway 1A. Its section in Thailand has been built and just 34 kilometres in the Cambodian section remain to be completed. Vietnam's 220-m section, which runs on the western coast of the Cuu Long (Mekong) Delta and is expected to be completed at the end of 2013, will need an investment of about $500 million, Minh said. The Asian Development Bank (ADB) will loan Vietnam $75 million for the first phase of the project, which costs $390 million. The remaining capital will be sourced through a $25 million ODA loan from Australia and a preferential loan of $134 million from South Korea. Vietnam will use its contingency cost for site clearance. The second phase of the project is also expected to receive capital assistance from ADB fund. Experts have said the highway will enhance the socio-economic development of not only the provinces of Kien Giang and Ca Mau, but also the adjacent provinces of Can Tho, An Giang, Bac Lieu and Soc Trang. The highway would be a great motivation for the development of localities in the region of Ca Mau Peninsula, said Bui Ngoc Suong, chair of Kien Giang Province People's Committee. "Residents in the region expressed happiness with the project when we conducted studies for the highway," he said. Suong added that the prospects of the highway have brought the province an average growth rate of 12 percent in the last three years. "Many overseas Vietnamese in Thailand told me they would invest in the homeland when they can visit the provinces by car," he said. Duong Tien Dung, deputy chair of Ca Mau Province People's Committee, said the highway would pass by several industrial parks and economic hubs of the province, significantly improving the delivery of cargoes from these sites. Chalermkiat Salakkham, director of the Laem Chabang Port in Thailand's Chonburi Province told the Sai Gon Tiep Thi newspaper that he expected the port to boost circulation of cargo from Cambodia and Vietnam. Cambodian Kok Kong Town's authorities have developed several recreation zones in the area near Thai border that Bangkok residents can reach in just four hours by car. Authorities in Kien Giang and Ca Mau provinces are carrying out site clearance works for the construction of the highway, which ADB country director in Vietnam, Ayumi Konishi, has called a corridor that will open up opportunities for cooperation and development. Sai Gon Tiep Thi - March 12, 2010 Vietnam dissident vows to carry on struggle after prison Author: Vietnam aujourd'hui HANOI — A Vietnamese lawyer and dissident vowed on Wednesday to carry on her struggle for democracy days after leaving jail, where she spent three years for challenging the Communist authorities. Le Thi Cong Nhan, 30, told AFP she would not let up in her campaign for democracy despite already having been called in by police for breaking the terms of her house arrest since leaving prison on Saturday. Speaking by telephone, she said prison had strengthened her "faith in the struggle". "I struggled for democracy and human rights, and I will continue to struggle for democracy and human rights," she said. Officially stripped of her status as a lawyer, Nhan was arrested in March 2007 with a colleague, Nguyen Van Dai, who is still serving a four-year prison term. Analysts say Vietnam's authorities have clamped down on dissent in the last three years after the country hosted a summit of the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation forum (APEC) and joined the World Trade Organisation in early 2007. Both lawyers were convicted for writing documents criticising the authorities, denigrating the regime in the foreign media and using the law classes they taught to advocate human rights. Nhan admitted at her trial being a member of a banned political party, the Vietnam Progression Party, and of a pro-democracy movement, Block 8406, which called for a boycott of sham parliamentary elections. But she denied having violated the law. She insists that while the Communist Party's leading role in the country is enshrined in the constitution, "no provision in the law forbids the foundation of a party in Vietnam." Nhan was unable to go ahead with a face-to-face interview with AFP scheduled around the time when she was called in by police on Tuesday. She said police reprimanded her for going shopping too far from her home, but she thought the reprimand was actually linked to the planned interview. Some observers see a link between heightened repression in Vietnam and next year's Communist Party Congress, at which high-ranking leadership posts will be apportioned. At least 16 militants have been jailed since last October, including another lawyer, Le Cong Dinh, and a young French-trained Internet blogger, Nguyen Tien Trung. Agence France Presse - March 10, 2010 Nuclear energy in Vietnam's power generation in future Author: Vietnam aujourd'hui PARIS - Nuclear energy is expected to account for a remarkable proportion in Vietnam's power generation in the future, Vietnam news agency reported, citing to Minister of Science and Technology Hoang Van Phong, as saying. In an interview granted to a Vietnam News Agency correspondent on the sidelines of the International Conference on Access to Civil Nuclear Energy held here, Phong said that the application and development of atomic energy for peaceful purposes is one of the country's socio-economic development objectives in the next decades. The conference was held from this March 8 to March 9. "Nuclear power plants will contribute considerably to the country's annual electricity output, helping meet demands for production and daily activities as well as ensure the sustainable development of the national economy during the process of industrialisation and modernisation," he said. Developing nuclear energy will create a favourable environment for the development of many other industries, including those requiring high scientific and technical standards, he added. According to Minister Phong, in January 2006, the Prime Minister approved the Strategy on Atomic Energy Application for Peaceful Purposes by 2020. The National Assembly also passed the Atomic Energy Law in June 2007 and approved a policy to build nuclear power plants in the country in November 2009. The Vietnamese government is focusing on building a full and consistent system of legal documents that meets international standards for the nuclear energy sector, including specific plans for each agency and each area as well as human resource training schemes, he said. The government is also speeding up education work to raise the awareness of people and the whole society of the importance of nuclear power plants as well as possible risks. Vietnam's first nuclear power plant is expected to be put into operation in 2020. Bernama - March 11, 2010 Author: Vietnam aujourd'hui HA NOI - Viet Nam has made great strides in terms of economic performance, but at the same time, there are signs of rising economic inequality and disparity in the country. The statement was made by United Nations Resident Co-ordinator John Hendra at a conference to launch the Asia-Pacific Human Development Report on Gender. This was backed up by figures provided by the UN on three aspects of gender inequality in Viet Nam: economic power, political voice and legal rights. In Viet Nam, women make up 46.6 per cent of the workforce but most women work in the informal sector which is not covered by social protection. Furthermore, as more than half of working women are unpaid family workers, they receive no direct income. Those who are paid earn only 87 per cent of the hourly wage received by men. According to the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF)'s first nationwide family survey, Vietnamese women do not have an equal say in decision-making at the household level, and have a lower level of ownership and control over key assets, such as houses, land and large-scale purchases. Besides, only a few Vietnamese women hold important political positions. Though Viet Nam has the highest rate of female participation in the National Assembly among ASEAN countries, women are not well-represented in senior decision-making in the Party and in the administration: only one minister and five deputy ministers are women. Vietnamese women are also hindered by their retirement age of 55, while that for men is 60. This might not only limit women's chances of promotion and access to training, but also discourage employers from hiring women, the review of Vietnamese legal documents by the United Nations Development Fund for Women said. To make the situation even worse, a recent study by the Supreme People's Court estimated that 21 per cent of couples experience domestic violence. Almost two-thirds of women believe it is acceptable for men to beat their wives, the General Statistics Office 2006 Survey said. "The silence and stigma that surround violence against women is so strong that many women are afraid to speak out," Hendra said. He suggested that it was necessary to ensure that all Vietnamese families value girls equally with boys and invest in their capabilities and well-being. Threat to survival The 2010 Asia-Pacific Human Development Report (Power, Voice and Rights: a Turning Point for Gender Equality in Asia and the Pacific) found that discrimination and neglect were threatening women's very survival in the Asia-Pacific region, where women suffered from some of the world's lowest rates of political representation, employment and property ownership. It provided recommendations for action across the three areas covered (power, voice and rights) including removing barriers to women's ownership of assets, expanding paid employment, making migration safe and investing in high-quality education and health. AsiaOne (.sg) - March 11, 2010 __ Still more to be done on VN gender equality, says UN official Vietnam is an acknowledged leader in the region in promoting gender equality but more still needs to be done to bring about gender equality between Vietnamese men and women. The remark was made by John Hendra, UN Resident Coordinator to Vietnam , at a press briefing in Hanoi on March 9 to announce the 2010 Asia-Pacific Human Development Report. Hendra confirmed that the Vietnamese government had increasingly made more commitments in gender equality and the advancement of women. In Vietnam, one in four National Assembly members is a woman – the highest participation rate among ASEAN countries--and the number of women doing business in Vietnam is also high, accounting for 46.6 percent of the country’s labour force, said the report. However, the report indicated that Vietnamese women are not well-represented in senior decision-making in the Party or the administration. Only one minister and five out of 82 vice-ministers are women, the report went on to say. And most Vietnamese women are taking unstable jobs in the informal sector with uncertain income and without social protection, the report added. The report warned that if the sex ratio continues going up in Vietnam , the country will have a surplus male population starting in 2025. The sex ratio at birth in 2008 was 112 to 100, up from 110 to 100 in 2006, said the report. “In order for women in Vietnam to have an equal say in the decisions that affect their lives, equal access to and control over economic resources, and equal access to legal rights and protection, we need to ensure that all Vietnamese families value their girls equally with boys and invest in their capabilities and well-being”, Hendra concluded. Vietnam News Agency - March 9, 2010 Many overseas Vietnamese want to buy apartments, property Author: Vietnam aujourd'hui Some 400 Vietnamese living abroad, or Viet Kieu, gathered at the Sunrise City complex project in HCM City's District 7 last week for a meeting, with many of them showing keen interest to buy houses or invest in the property sector in Vietnam. At the meeting, which was held by the Overseas Vietnamese Communication Association and Novaland, developer the project, 98 Viet Kieu said they wanted to buy hi -end apartments and invest in the property sector. Do Thi Loan, general secretary of the HCM City Real Estate Association, explained that huge investment into the city's traffic and infrastructure was driving up the development of the property market. this is also a good opportunity for Viet Kieu to buy a house as a good investment because property prices continue to increase. Lawyer Truong Thi Hoa attended the event, offering legal information about the policy allowing Viet Kieu to purchase houses in Vietnam. She said the legal corridor allowed most Viet Kieu to own housing with the right to give as a present, lease, resell or mortgage their properties. However, Viet Kieu who want to buy houses in Vietnam are worried about legal procedures. "Therefore, Viet Kieu should chose good projects, which will supply housing ownership certificates, and should look or project developers who abide by legal procedures;' Hoa noted. City vice chairman Nguyen Thanh Tai told the meeting the Government had advanced new policies like the citizenship law, the exemption of entry visas and especially the land, housing, estate, property law to help Viet Kieu buy and own housesin Vietnam easily. However, relevant agencies are waiting for clear instructions from the Construction Ministry to make it easier for Viet Kieu to buy houses in Vietnam. To help Viet Kieu with legal information on property and house ownership in Vietnam, Novaland has cooperated with law offices to establish a service division to supply free information at + 1 (714) 793 8186 in the U.S., +61 (2) 8005 6725 in Australia and +44 (20) 3239 9091 in the UK and in Europe. Saigon Times Daily - March 11, 2010 Vietnam to publish book on sovereignty over Spratly and Paracel archipelagos Author: Vietnam aujourd'hui HANOI - Vietnam is about to publish a geographic anthology offering data and important historical evidence to illustrate the nation's sovereignty over the Spratly and Paracel archipelagos, according to Vietnam news agency on Tuesday. The Vietnam Geographic Anthology, to be circulated by the Youth Publishing House, has four chapters that include 40 of the most famous works on geography, starting with the Tran dynasty of the 13th century through 1954. The writings were composed by the giants of Vietnamese letters and history, such as Nguyen Trai, Le Quy Don, Phan Huy Chu, Truong Vinh Ky, Dao Van Hoi, Bui Duong Lich, Vuong Duy Trinh, Ngo Vi Lien and Dao Duy Anh. The publication also offers up an ancient map of the Le dynasty and the "Phu bien tap luc" a miscellany compiled by the 18th century scholar Le Quy Don that identifies the locations, and cites legal documents related to the Vietnamese people's sovereignty over the two groups of islands that have been preserved through many different feudal dynasties. According to Chief Author Bui Van Vuong, the anthology is a set of very important and reliable historic data that helps reaffirm Vietnam's sovereignty over the Spratly and Paracel archipelagos. Vuong and his associates have spent ten years collecting, researching and compiling the Vietnam Geographic Anthology. Bernama - March 9, 2010 Vietnam's farmers go bananas over lucrative export crop Author: Vietnam aujourd'hui HCM CITY - A number of provinces around the country plan to concentrate on growing bananas for export, due to increasing world demand. The central province of Quang Tri grows chuoi moc, a banana variety unique to that region. Most of its bananas end up in mainland China. Farmers in the province exported more than 400 tonnes of bananas at VND4.5 million (S$340) a tonne this lunar new year. Nguyen Van Quy, head of Huong Hoa District People's Committee's Agriculture Department, where chuoi moc is the chief export crop, said bananas are grown on 1,300ha of farmland. He said each hectare earned between VND40-VND50 million a year. About 50 tonnes of bananas are harvested each day by farmers for export. Last year, the district's total exports were worth VND70 billion. In the northern province of Lao Cai, farmers also earn lucrative incomes from growing bananas. Tran Thi Mai, from Muong Khuong District's Ban Lau Commune, said she earned VND200 million a year from her 15,000 banana plants. In Thong Nhat District's Quang Trung Commune, in the south-eastern province of Dong Nai, bananas are grown on more than 1,200ha of farmland. Kien Giang Province's Co-operative Alliance and the U Minh Thuong District People's Committee plan to expand banana cultivation ten-fold in the U Minh Thuong National Park's buffer zone to 2,000ha. Dr Nguyen Van Khai, a well-known agricultural consultant, said bananas were one of 14 kinds of fruit that played an important part in the nation's export industry. "Bananas were typically grown only on uncultivated land. The plants acted as natural fences to protect farmers' gardens, but now everything is different. Bananas are quite simple to grow and proper cultivation will surely bring bumper crops," he said. The Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development has developed a plan to grow vegetables, fruits, and ornamental trees including a target to increase banana exports to 100,000 tonnes, worth $35 million, this year. AsiaOne Business - March 10, 2010 Hanoi archbishop hospitalised in Rome Author: Vietnam aujourd'hui ROME — Hanoi's controversial Archbishop Joseph Ngo Quang Kiet has been admitted to hospital in Rome for "chronic insomnia and stress", the Asianews religious news agency said Monday Kiet, who was hospitalised here on Friday, came to Rome for additional care after receiving treatment at the Chau Son monastery in Vietnam, the report said. News of Kiet's departure from Vietnam sparked "speculation about his possible removal" from the Hanoi archdiocese, the Rome-based news agency said. The Vietnamese government has repeatedly pressed the Vatican to remove the 57-year-old prelate, who has spearheaded protests over seizures of Roman Catholic Church real estate by the communist authorities, Asianews said. "We are priests, we need not fear God. If this is what God wants, we serve in faith, not in fear," Kiet told a delegation before leaving Vietnam, adding that "prayers and solidarity are the weapons of the Church", Asianews reported. Vietnamese Catholics began protesting in December 2007 over property confiscated since the end of French colonial rule in 1954, occasionally clashing with police. Vietnam has Southeast Asia's largest Roman Catholic community after the Philippines -- about six million in a population of 86 million, but religious activity remains under state control. Kiet said he hoped God "will gift me the blessing of good health and I will be able to serve him", Asianews said. Agence France Presse - March 8, 2010 Vietnam to consider mining coal in Red River delta rice basket Author: Vietnam aujourd'hui Vietnam's largest mining company wants to begin mining huge coal deposits in the Red River delta, one of the country's most-populated agricultural areas, officials said Monday. The Song Hong Energy Company, an affiliate of state-owned mining conglomerate Vinacomin, has applied for permission to launch a pilot mining project in Hung Yen province, some 30 kilometres southeast of Hanoi. "We are just waiting for the permission of the prime minister," said Nguyen Thanh Son, director of Song Hong. The 6.5-million-dollar pilot project would mine 1,800 tons of coal over a six-month period. To minimize the environmental impact, the project is to use a technology that gasifies the coal underground. Geologists estimate coal deposits in Vietnam's Red River delta at 210 billion tons, of which 65 billion could be exploited. The delta produces roughly 20 per cent of Vietnam's rice. Vietnam's coal mines are centered in the coastal province of Quang Ninh, which has suffered severe environmental damage from open-pit mining. In one town studied by the Hanoi University of Natural Sciences, coal-dust contamination was hundreds of times higher than safe levels. Nguyen Phu Vu, the vice rector of Vietnam's University of Mining and Geology, was cautious about the Red River delta mining project. "We need to study the geography of the region more carefully to avoid environmental pollution and food safety problems, if we start mining in a larger area of the delta," Vu said. Vu is a member of a committee formed to study the environmental impact of mining in the delta by the Ministry of Industry and Trade and the Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment. It was not yet clear whether foreign partners would participate in the pilot project. Son said Japan's Marubeni Corporation and Australia's Linc Energy had expressed an interest. Deutsche Presse Agentur - March 9, 2010 Vietnam plans visa fee exemption this year Author: Vietnam aujourd'hui The Vietnam National Tourism Administration said it will seek approval from the government to have foreign visitors exempted from visa fees later this year to boost the country’s tourism. The fee exemption scheme is expected to begin when the administration launches a two-month sales promotion for tourists in August or in September. The government last year agreed to exempt visa fees for tourists who booked tours under the 2009 national campaign “Impressive Vietnam.” Visa fees for tourist entry into Vietnam are now US$25. Tourists can be charged higher by travel agencies. Ung Phuong Dung, director of Indochina Service Vietnam, said last year her company had around 200 tourists eligible for visa fee exemption every month, but most of them had not known about the benefit beforehand. Such a program needed to be promoted better to foreign visitors, she said. Foreign arrivals in February rose 30.2 percent from a year ago to around 446,000. The country expects to receive 4.5-4.6 million foreign tourists this year, up 18-21 percent from 2009. Thanh Nien News - March 8, 2010 Vietnam human rights lawyer freed after serving 3 years in prison Author: Vietnam aujourd'hui HANOI — A Vietnamese human rights lawyer has been released from prison after serving a three-year sentence for spreading propaganda against the state. Le Thi Cong Nhan was released Saturday from Prison Number 5 in northern Thanh Hoa province and was escorted by police to her home in Hanoi, said prison chief Luong Van Tuyen. Nhan, 30, still has to serve three years of house arrest. In May 2007, Nhan was sentenced by a Hanoi court for violating Article 88 of Vietnam's penal code, which broadly prohibits spreading propaganda against the state. An appeals court reduced her jail time from four to three years in November of that year. A fellow lawyer who was convicted along with Nhan, Nguyen Van Dai, was sentenced to five years in prison. His sentence was reduced by one year. His release from prison is not expected for another year. The two were accused of using the Internet to call for a multiparty state in Vietnam, where the ruling Communist Party does not tolerate dissent. They also gave interviews to foreign news agencies. International human rights groups and western governments have often criticized Vietnam's poor human rights record. Over the past four months, Vietnam has jailed 16 pro-democracy activists. Among them was attorney Le Cong Dinh, who represented Nhan and made an impassioned defence of free expression during her trial. Authorities sent Dinh to prison in January after convicting him of subversion charges unrelated to Nhan's case. The Associated Press - March 8, 2010 Vietnam’s first-quarter rice exports may drop 25% Author: Vietnam aujourd'hui Vietnam’s rice exports may drop 25 percent to 1.2 million metric tons in the first quarter as foreign buyers reduce orders on expectations that prices will decline, an official said today. “Falling commercial demand slowed our exports this quarter,” said Truong Thanh Phong, chairman of the Ho Chi Minh City-based Vietnam Food Association. “Foreign buyers expect that our prices will drop further but we expect orders will start to pick up from May.” Vietnam, the world’s second-biggest rice shipper after Thailand, exported a record 6 million metric tons last year and plans to ship a similar amount this year, said Phong. “Demand for rice from buyer countries was low and they also wanted to wait and see what the output levels were in producing countries,” said Nguyen Hieu Tam, head of rice research at Vietnam Market Analysis and Forecast Joint-Stock Co., a Hanoi-based research company for agricultural products. “Some African buyers also had financial difficulties in buying our rice,” she said today. El Nino, caused by a warming of the equatorial Pacific Ocean, may slow production in major rice producers including India and Indonesia, helping boost exports from Vietnam, which produced a bumper winter-spring harvest, Tam said by phone. Thailand’s rough rice harvest may decline 15 percent in the year that began Oct. 1 because of dry weather caused by the El Nino weather phenomenon, the country’s Office of Agricultural Economics said on Jan. 13. Rice Stockpiling The Vietnam Food Association’s Phong forecast in November that prices would surge 50 percent to about $800 a ton by the end of the second quarter next year on increasing demand and unfavorable weather conditions. The country’s average export price from Jan. 1 to Feb. 28 was $473 a ton, according to the association’s Web site. Rice futures traded in Chicago have dropped 12 percent this year, compared with a 22 percent slump in the same period last year. The most-active contract gained 0.3 percent to $13.13 per 100 pounds at 12:20 p.m. in Singapore. The price climbed to record $25.07 in April 2008. The Vietnam Food Association is asking its 30 member companies to buy 1 million tons from farmers for stockpiling after prices dropped in the Mekong Delta, according to a report on the group’s Web site. The Mekong Delta is Vietnam’s main rice producing region. More than 300,000 tons have been bought under this plan, Tuoi Tre newspaper reported today, citing Pham Van Bay, the group’s vice chairman. Foreign Warehouses The Southeast Asian nation also plans to start construction of a rice processing plant and warehouse in Cambodia by the end of the second quarter to support exports, according to Nguyen Tho Tri, deputy director of the Vietnam Southern Food Corp, which also has a stake in the project. Another stockpiling warehouse will be built in the Philippines this year, he said, declining to give further details. The Vietnamese government is trying to boost exports to help meet an economic growth target of 6.5 percent this year, from 5.3 percent last year. Rice was the country’s fifth-biggest foreign exchange earner this year as of the end of February. By Van Nguyen - Bloomberg - March 8, 2010 Low fines for work safety infringements blamed for Vietnam deaths Author: Vietnam aujourd'hui Occupational accidents and deaths are on the rise in Vietnam because the fines for safety violations are inadequate, a Vietnamese official said Thursday. The increase in accidents is mainly due to companies preferring to pay fines rather than invest in safety measures, said Phan Dang Tho, vice director of the inspections department at Vietnam's Ministry of Labour, Invalids and Social Affairs. "The most significant factor is inadequate punishment," Tho said. "The compensation for each fatal case is just equal to a few dozen months' income for an employee, so they are not afraid." Figures released Monday by the ministry showed there were 6,250 occupational accidents in 2009 resulting in 550 deaths, representing increases from 2008 of 7 percent and 6%, respectively. Occupational safety has been in the news in Vietnam since a sixth worker was killed last week on the Keangnam Tower construction project in western Hanoi. The worker was killed by falling debris after a formwork, a mould used for pouring concrete structures, collapsed 14 stories above him. Workers have also died in scaffolding collapses and other accidents. Hanoi city authorities on Wednesday launched an investigation into the latest accident at the tower, slated to be Vietnam's highest at 336 metres. The real number of workplace accidents in Vietnam is assumed to be far higher than statistics show because most are never reported. The ministry's deputy minister told a press conference Wednesday that the inspections system is failing to improve workplace standards, the newspaper Thanh Nien reported. Deutsche Presse Agentur - March 6, 2010 Vietnam tourism to launch new marketing campaign Author: Vietnam aujourd'hui The Vietnam National Administration of Tourism (VNAT) will launch a national marketing campaign called Vietnam - Your Destination, to woo both local and foreign travellers, after the success of last year's Impressive Vietnam project, an official said. According to the VNAT draft, the campaign's activities would promote the country to tourists by implementing promotion programmes, designing new products and improving service quality. VNAT will combine with relevant departments and entrepreneurs to offer cheaper prices for travel and related services to foreign and local guests during the low season. "The programme will take place during August-September or September -October;' Vu The Binh, head of the Travel Department of VNAT told the Daily yesterday. To coincide with the campaign, VNAT will encourage tourism service providers to offer 10 to 30 percent discounts to their customers. For international tourists, VNAT will ask tour operators to create specific products relevant to the market. Each market will have at least one special promotion tour for travellers, as well as one to two familiarisation trips for foreign travel agents and media. VNAT is also working to develop MICE (Meetings, Incentives, Conventions, and Exhibitions) tourism and accordingly will encourage tour operators to follow suit, organising and selling the events. VNAT will continue to carry out promotion activities in key markets including China, North Asia, France and West Europe, the US, Australia, New Zealand, Asean and Russia. Through the programme, VNAT will give all international tourists who travel to Vietnam under package tours a souvenir. The gifts will be symbolic to Vietnam. The tourism department sees overseas Vietnamese residents as particularly important in Vietnam's promotion. Through the programme the VNAT plan to call such people back to their home country, and to encourage other foreign travellers to visit too. To promote the programme, the department will organise meetings with Overseas Vietnamese Societies in France, America, England, and Australia. According to Binh, the Vietnam Your Destination programme is more than just a marketing programme, but a means to improve tourism products and services. As part of the campaign, VNAT will organise a competition to find the best souvenir gift design. Binh said the department had received positive feedback from relevant stakeholders. They have submitted the plan to the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism. "We expect the ministry will approve the programme this weekend;' Binh said. The Saigon Times Daily - March 6, 2010 Vietnam feels the heat of a 100-year drought Author: Vietnam aujourd'hui HANOI - Every year, even at the peak of Vietnam's dry season, when the Red River is at its lowest, Hanoi's skilled captains manage to negotiate their flat-bottomed boats through its shallow waters. But this year, with a drought gripping the entire country and water levels at record lows, the river is eerily quiet. What is normally a bustling waterway is becoming a winding river of sand, and farmers who depend upon the river for irrigation are watching the expanding sandbars as nervously as the boat captains. "If there is no water in the coming days," says 59-year-old farmer Vu Thi La, who just put in her spring rice seedlings, "it will all die." Across Vietnam, high temperatures and parched rivers are setting off alarm bells as the nation grapples with what's shaping up to be its worst drought in more than 100 years. At 0.68 meters high, the Red River is at its lowest level since records started being kept in 1902. With virtually no rainfall since September, timber fires are burning in the north and tinder-dry conditions threaten forests in the south. Soaring temperatures in the central part of Vietnam have unleashed a plague of rice-eating insects, damaging thousands of hectares of paddies. "It's the beginning of everything," Nguyen Lan Chau, vice director of the National Center for Hydro-Meteorological Forecasting, says gloomily. The region most affected — and the one that affects the most — is the Mekong River Delta in the south. Water levels in the nation's rice bowl have fallen to their lowest points in nearly 20 years, threatening the livelihoods of tens of millions of people who depend on the river basin for farming, fishing and transportation. The biggest problem, however, is not the water. It's the salt. During the dry season, when channels and tributaries run dry, seawater can creep more than 18 miles (30 km) inland. Vietnam has installed a series of sluice gates to hold back high tides as well as control annual monsoon flooding. This has allowed farmers to switch between growing rice in the wet season and raising shrimp in the brackish waters in the dry. The result has been more-effective land use and higher crop yields, and a doubling of farmers' incomes in the Delta since 1999. Those high-yield days may be over. As the drought intensifies, in some places seawater has crept nearly 40 miles (60 km) inland, says Dam Hoa Binh, deputy director of the Irrigation Department at the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development in Hanoi. Most of the winter-spring crop has already been harvested, but saltwater is reaching where it has never gone before, putting the summer-fall crop in jeopardy, says Binh. "We are trying to strengthen our irrigation systems to prevent further salinization," he adds, but the extreme conditions are making it "one of the most difficult situations in 100 years." (See pictures of drought in Kenya.) Because of the hydropower projects on its side of the border, China frequently gets the blame for water shortages downstream. Indeed, Vietnam's neighbor has been on an aggressive campaign to damn the Mekong River, which begins on the Tibetan plateau and travels through five other countries before it empties into the South China Sea. According to the Mekong River Commission, a regional advisory agency, China has built or is planning to build eight dams along the Mekong. But while dams raise huge concerns about interfering with sediment flow and fish migration, they can also have a positive impact, says Jeremy Bird, the commission's chief executive officer. "They will redistribute the flow of water, therefore there will be more water available in the dry season," he says. But at the moment, with China also experiencing extreme drought, there appears to be little dammed water to release. Up north, Vietnam has been busy building hydropower dams as well. The government recently released enough water from those projects to help farmers in the Red River Delta with spring planting. Now with reservoir levels in the north at critical lows, the state-owned electricity company says it can't let go of much more; power demand is expected to break records as temperatures soar this month. Even with the small amount released, Nguyen Van Thang, director of the agriculture department in Vinh Phuc province, is not hopeful. High temperatures and evaporation are the enemy. "Even if farmers bail every single drop of water to nurture the rice," he says, he fears that a third of the rice crop in his province could be lost. The crisis has been a "wakeup call" for Vietnam, says Ian Wilderspin, senior technical adviser for disaster risk management at the U.N. Development Program in Hanoi. The drought was predicted, he says, referring to last year's projections that El Niño would bring an unusually warm and dry winter. Yet Vietnam traditionally prepares for floods and typhoons, which are more dramatic and devastating when they hit. "Drought is a slow, silent disaster, which in the long run will have a more profound impact on peoples' livelihoods," he says. And when are the rains due to finally bring some relief? Meteorologists forecast that in the north, rain will arrive later this month. But other parts of the country might not see any precipitation until August, which for many will be too late. By Martha Ann - Time - March 4, 2010 N Korea teaches Vietnam how to party Author: Vietnam aujourd'hui North Korean experts were in Vietnam this week to advise the government on - no, not uranium enrichment - choreography for an extravaganza celebrating Hanoi's 1,000th anniversary, state media said. The delegation was led by Song Pyong Won, deputy director of the Arirang performance department in North Korea's Ministry of Culture, and included experts in mass performance, stage design, sound and lighting, reported the website of the newspaper Saigon Tiep Thi (sgtt.com.vn). "This is the advance team that will make preparations for the various art performances, including card flipping to make images and words, as well as stage design, sound and lighting for the opening ceremony," the newspaper said. Hanoi will mark its 1,000th anniversary on October 10 this year. Song hoped "through this visit the delegation would gain a precise grasp of the basic material conditions in Vietnam, like human resources, so that the staged programme can be the most unique and best possible," the article said. The group met representatives of Vietnam's Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism and planned to visit various anniversary event venues, including the 40,000-seat My Dinh Stadium. It would also visit other sites, such as Ho Chi Minh's mausoleum, it said. Impoverished and isolated, North Korea has little to export and its tourism earnings have been hit by political wrangling with South Korea over the North's military threats to the region and nuclear weapons programme. The Arirang mass games are part dance show, part circus and part communist propaganda spectacle involving tens of thousands of tightly choreographed performers. They feature massive flip-card animation routines. Reuters / TVNZ - March 5, 2010 |