Four dead after eating poison mushrooms

Four of five family members hospitalised earlier this month for mushroom poisoning died yesterday, according to Bach Mai Hospital's Anti-poison Centre.

The family from the northern province of Thai Nguyen was poisoned by eating mushrooms collected from the forest.

They were admitted to the Anti-poison Center in Ha Noi for treatment on March 9.

Three cases of mushroom poisoning have been reported this month in the northern province of Thai Nguyen and Tuyen Quang.

Two die in Ha Giang fire

Two people were killed yesterday in a massive fire that burnt down a house in the northern mountainous Ha Giang Province.

The blaze broke out at about 1a.m in a wooden house in Meo Vac District.

The owner of the house, Hoang Thi Huong, managed to escape but two other persons, whose bodies have not been identified yet, were killed, according to the local police.

The authorities are investigating the incident.

Northern province battles cross-border smuggling

Authorities in the northern province of Quang Ninh say they are struggling to deal with a marked spike in cross-border smuggling of all kind of goods including drugs, liquor, meat and rare wood.

"From February 16 to March 15, we recorded 25 cases of smuggling of goods valued at about VND1.17 billion (US$55,000). This is an increase of more than 56 per cent over the same period last year," Le Manh Tung, a provincial Customs Department official told Viet Nam News.

In the first quarter of the year, nearly 3kgs of heroin and over 2,700 ecstasy pills were seized by local customs officials.

They also uncovered more than 40 cases of cross-border smuggling on land and through waterways in the first quarter, seizing contraband goods including large quantities of tobacco, wine, cosmetics, electronic products, valuable and rare wood as well as seafood worth nearly VND3 billion ($142,000).

Since the beginning of the year, 100 kilograms of roast ducks and 2,000 pigeons have been seized as they were being smuggled into Viet Nam, according to the provincial Customs Department.

"We have met a lot of difficulties in cracking down on smugglers because of the tough terrain involved. Smugglers usually carry goods across many paths near highways 1A and 4B and use small trucks to transport contraband goods to domestic markets for consumption," Tung said.

He said the Customs Department would co-operate with local authorities to step up the fight against smuggling of fake goods and other forms of trade fraud.

They would also step up efforts to prevent the smuggling of poultry, given the threat of avian flu epidemics in the country, he added.

Ten injured in Muong Xen car accident

Ten artists from the 4th Military Zone troupe were injured yesterday when the car carrying them ran off the road in Muong Xen town, 280 km from Vinh city.

Local authorities and police took them to the hospital for treatment.

The artists had performed the previous evening in a public entertainment programme for local residents.

The cause of the accident is under investigation.

Vietnam hosts conference on illegal wildlife trade

Domestic and foreign experts and policy markers joined a conference to discuss global solutions to transnational wildlife trafficking in Hanoi on March 24.

The conference was hosted by the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES) in Vietnam.

Deputy Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development Ha Cong Tuan, said that slaughtering and trafficking wildlife as well as demand for wildlife consumption is a global issue, requiring countries to take drastic and prompt action to bring it under control.

Vietnam was committed to closely working with other countries in an attempt to fight against wildlife crime, Tuan added.

CITIES Vietnam Director Do Quang Tung said that this year the CITES Vietnam would also submit solutions to deal with seized rhino horns and elephant tusks by 2015.

The CITIES Vietnam also planned to finish a draft circular to instruct authorized agencies how to charge criminals for trafficking rhino horn and elephant tusk by the end of this year, he said.

Sussan Lieberman, Executive of Director of Conservation Policy for the Wildlife Conservation Society was committed to its long standing collaboration with the Government of Vietnam and other governments around the world, to effectively tackle this problem.

“We welcomed the statement from Deputy Minister Tuan who announced that his ministry was considering the destruction of Vietnam’s stockpile of rhino horn, ivory and tiger bone, telling both the world and its citizens that there was no place in Vietnam for wildlife trafficking or the consumption or trade in endangered species such as rhinos,” she said.

If this decision was turned into action, it would set a high standard for other governments and reinforce Vietnam’s commitment to treating wildlife crime a serious crime, she said.

Vietnam attends SEA Red Cross Leadership Meeting in Singapore

A Vietnam Red Cross delegation led by its Vice President and Secretary Doan Van Thai is attending the South East Asia Red Cross Red Crescent Leadership Meeting (SEA RCRC) in Singapore from March 24-26.

The event also draws representatives Red Cross societies from 10 other Southeast Asian countries as well as leaders of the International Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC) and the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC).

It aims to seek collaboration in mitigating and confronting the humanitarian challenges faced by the regional countries.

At the opening ceremony, Masagos Zulkifli, Senior Minister of State at Singapore’s Foreign Ministry, lauded the Red Cross Red Crescent Movement for being at the forefront of serving the vulnerable for more than 150 years.

He urged the meeting to leverage the common principles and operations shared within the Red Cross Movement, together with the cultural understanding of cooperation within ASEAN, to enhance SEA RCRC’s effectiveness in responding to humanitarian crisis and serving the vulnerable.

Also on this occasion, the Singapore Red Cross launched Humanitarian Lecture Series, which Masagos affirmed, will help grow the knowledge and understanding of humanitarian law and action in Singapore and the region.

Bekele Geleta, Secretary General of the IFRC, delivered a public lecture on “Humanitarian Diplomacy in Action”, discussing the evolving global humanitarian diplomacy agenda and the opportunities it brings for the humanitarian community in Southeast Asia.

He also spoke about the importance of creating a global dialogue with the younger generation using modern technologies, maintaining and growing auxiliary relations with governments as well as the need to build and sharpen delivery capacity.

Vietnam funds Lao museum upgrade

Vietnam’s Ho Chi Minh Museum will implement a VND14 billion project to refurbish Laos’ Kaysone Phomvihane museum.

A document to this effect was signed in Laos’ capital Vientine on March 24.

The Vietnamese museum will help its Lao counterpart renovate the main hall, paint the museum, decorate the Lao cultural symbol, and refurbish the funeral showroom of the Lao President Kaysone Phomvihane.

The upgrade will ensure the future long-term operation of the museum.

The museum, built by non-refundable aid from the Vietnamese Government, is to honor  Laos’ great revolutionary leader Kaysone Phomvihane.

Childcare staff to receive training

Prime Minister Nguyen Tan Dung has approved a project to train 80 per cent of private daycares' teachers and babysitters in industrial and export processing zones nationwide by 2020.

Seventy per cent of the children under the age of three, who are located in the areas where the project will be implemented, will also be kept at centres adhering to high-quality standards, he stated.

Mothers of the children will be offered training in childcare to enhance the role of families in child development.

The Viet Nam Women's Union will work in tandem with the Ministry of Education and Training to provide training courses.

Expenses will be covered by the State, local companies, organisations, and individual donations.

Communication campaigns will also be launched to increase the involvement of local authorities and enterprises in supporting the project.

The government's financial assistance will help to build new centres, while upgrading the current ones, the prime minister remarked.

A total of 500 private centres will receive support through this initiative.

The project also encourages the professional exchange between private childcare centres in the industrial and export processing zones and local nursery schools.

According to a seminar held by the Ministry of Education and Training in Ha Noi on March 6, around 5,600 private nurseries operate illegally in 50 provinces and cities nationwide.

HCM City sees success in poverty reduction

HCM City has successfully implemented its poverty reduction programme for the 2009-15 period, it was reported at a conference held in the city last Saturday.

A report presented at the conference stated that by the end of 2013, the rate of the city's poor had fallen to 0.8 per cent, a large drop from the 8.4 per cent rate recorded in 2009.

The national standard, which was approved by the Government, prescribes that poor households are categorised as those with an average income of VND4.8 million (US$225) per person per year in rural areas and VND6 million ($282) in urban areas. Under that standard, the city now has no poor households.

Meanwhile, Secretary of the municipal Party Committee Le Thanh Hai said the city set its own poverty standard, with poor households categorised as having an annual average income less than VND16 million ($752) per person. Households earning less than VND21 million ($987) per person are considered as near-poor.

Under the new standard, the southern city now has 130,000 poor households, equivalent to 7.12 per cent of the city's total population, and 50,000 near-poor households, making up 2.73 per cent.

Hai added that the new standard was closer to those applied by other regional countries, and called for all local residents to participate in the sustainable poverty reduction programme.

He also asked local authorities to pay attention to building effective poverty reduction models, in combination with local socio-economic development, especially the construction of new-style rural areas.

He said this was necessary to better meet poor people's demands for essential goods and services, such as housing, healthcare services, education and jobs, Hai suggested.

In addition, he advised that preferential loans be offered to accelerate local agro-aquatic-forestry development and provide vocational training for rural labourers, in line with socio-economic development planning.

HCM City has allocated VND3.5 trillion (US$166 million) for its poverty reduction programme this year, an increase of VND672 billion from last year, according to the programme's steering committee, of this amount, VND130 billion ($6.1 million) will be used to augment a fund providing micro-credit to poor households.

As of last year nearly 82,000 such households had benefited from these loans.

The city aims to reduce the poverty rate each year by 2-2.5 percentage points over the next two years and the near-poverty rate by 1.5 percentage points.

Hanoi students respond to Earth Hour campaign

Ambassadors of the 2014 Earth Hour campaign joined some 1,000 students from the Hanoi University at an exchange programme on March 24 to popularise the drive.

Danish Ambassador John Nielsen, who is also an ambassador of the campaign, said he hopes young people will act more responsibly to protect the earth, starting with changes in their own daily lives.

Within the programme, participants took part in activities to promote the drive, including cycling around Hanoi’s streets and organising knowledge contests on saving energy.

Similar activities were also held at the Da Nang College of Economics under the University of Da Nang on March 22.

On March 6, the Ministry of Industry and Trade officially launched the Earth Hour campaign, aiming to raise public awareness of saving electricity and alleviating climate change threats.

Hanoi is planning a range of activities to respond to the campaign. As part of its efforts, decorative lighting and neon advertising boards will be turned off from 8:30-9:30pm on March 29 in Hanoi’s landmark venues such as Ngoc Son temple, Ly Thai To flower garden, Hanoi Opera House and the head offices of the municipal government and People’s Council.

New Rural Development Plan implemented in three regions

Authorities in the southeast, south-central and highlands regions are hard at work implementing the New Rural Development Plan.

Management hosted a meeting on March 24 in Da Lat Town to create a three-year plan. Deputy Prime Minister Vu Van Ninh, agency representatives and governments of 19 cities and provinces in the three regions participated in the meeting.

The New Rural Development Plan aims to upgrade agricultural techniques, improve farmers’ living standards, and develop rural infrastructure. Authorities in these regions have invested heavily on basic infrastructure including irrigation, traffic, clean water supply, school, market and cultural house construction.

The southeast region has 27 communes growing rubber, cashew and pepper. The south-central region has two communes building large boats and aquatic breeding farms. The highlands have 13 communes with forestry, industrial crops, and cattle farms as the main subsistence.

The federal government and local administration will support residents financially to purchase seeds and advanced agriculture techniques. They will work closely with companies and farmers to ensure peek consumption.

Deputy Prime Minister Ninh emphasized that the plan is an important mission. Local governments should be trained when appealing for social contribution.

Unemployment rate rang warning bells a decade ago

Several education experts said that the high unemployment rate among university graduates was warned about ten years ago, but the government has seemed to ignore it.

In 2004, Vietnam had about 100 industrial zones and 500,000 labourers. According to Nguyen Minh Thuyet, former head of NA's Committee for Culture and Education for Youth, there was a need for only 5-7% of university graduates, 60% of engineers and mechanics, while the rest of the workforce was dominated by labourers.

At a NA meeting in 2004, Thuyet warned that Vietnam's market only needed 13,000-15,000 university graduates each year. He said, "The high unemployment rate is understandable because the supply of human resources has far surpassed demand." However, universities and colleges provided over 200,000 graduates, and the number has now doubled.

From then to 2010, the number of universities and colleges had sharply increased even though many did not meet requirements. More graduates remain unemployed and have to resort to manual labour.

However, Professor Nguyen Xuan Han, from the National University in Hanoi, said such a high unemployment rate begs questions about the quality of education in Vietnam. The plans and strategies were already deemed unwise. "The number of university graduates continues increasing and we still lack skilled workers. The education sector must deal with this problem quickly," he said.

Several experts said that part of the blame should be placed on the students themselves, adding that they must equip themselves with the necessary skills and pursue suitable careers instead of depending on a university degree. Meanwhile, some people have asked about the government's responsibility in building strategies and regulating human resources.

"Human resources for some departments, such as pedagogy can totally be guessed at. Many universities have been opened purely for profit, forgetting their responsibility to teach students real skills. Even public universities are trying to enroll more and more students to gain from tuition fees. The government should be stricter on these institutions," Thuyet said.

Recently, the Ministry of Labour, Invalids and Social Affairs announced that 72,000 bachelor and master degree holders are currently unemployed. However, other experts have said the actual number is much higher, including graduates who have to work in fields that they are not trained in.

Nguyen Duc, the owner of a internet service provider, said, "Some graduates asked us for a monthly wage of VND20 million (USD952). But when I asked if they would be worth that much they kept silent. Students should focus on their real abilities rather than degrees."