MrTa Ba Hung from NATIF

According to Ta Ba Hung from the National Technology Innovation Fund (NATIF), there are about 400,000 Vietnamese with higher education levels living and working overseas, but only about 200 visit Vietnam to give lectures and work every year.

In 2014, Vietnam released Decree 87 on attracting overseas Vietnamese and foreigners to Vietnam to join science and technology research activities. However, no specialist has come to Vietnam under the program.

“Why don’t they come to Vietnam and enjoy the preferences Vietnam offers? It is because we try to attract intellectuals, but does not assign duties to them and does not create favorable environment for them to work,” he said.

“As there is no workplace for them to perform, we cannot retain them,” he commented.

A ‘clean’ political, economic and legal environment is the prerequisite for Vietnam to attract overseas Vietnamese intellectuals, experts say.

Nguyen Van Ve from the Vietnam Fatherland Front Central Committee agrees that the key to the problem is the environment – economic, political and legal. “Intellectuals will come if they find a ‘clean’ environment,” he said.

Mai Trong Nhuan, former director of Hanoi National University, said 70 percent of surveyed intellectuals highlighted working conditions as the most important factor for them, while salary was the seventh most important factor.

Hoang Van Ke, chair of the Hai Phong City Science & Technology Association, said he personally knows many overseas Vietnamese intellectuals who had spent millions of dollars to develop their projects in Vietnam. 

However, the investors later decided to give up the projects and leave Vietnam because they had met too many barriers.

All the experts, who attended a conference on attracting overseas Vietnamese intellectuals held several days ago, agreed that Vietnam doesn’t need to persuade intellectuals to return to settle down and work at any cost. 

“The most important thing is that we can use their knowledge and skills for the country's development. This still can be obtained even if they don’t live in Vietnam,” Nhuan said.

Nguyen Phu Binh from the Vietnam Fatherland Front said that it wasn't a bad thing that many Vietnamese students stayed overseas after finishing study. 

“If they stay and work overseas, they will have more knowledge and experience,” he said. “What we need to think about is whether we can attract them so they can devote themselves to the country’s development."

The participants at the conference also mentioned pay as an important factor to attract intellectuals. Prof Nguyen Lan Dung once said that his daughter, a PhD from the US, received VND3.5 million a month for her work at a university, but she paid VND5 million to a housemaid.