Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc visited Waikato University, a leading educational facility in the world, on March 14 morning (local time) before wrapping up his official visit to New Zealand.

Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc (centre) speaks at Waikato University

The PM was greeted with the traditional Maori greeting and talked with students at the university where many leaders of New Zealand studied at, including Prime Minister Jacinda Adern. 

He highlighted the growing relations between Vietnam and New Zealand in various fields such as economics, trade, investment, security, defense, and education since they established diplomatic ties in 1975.

At the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) Economic Leaders’ Week 2017 in Vietnam’s central city of Da Nang, the two countries worked actively to push the negotiation of the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP), a leading free trade pact in the region that balance interests of the involved parties.

Vietnam and New Zealand shared a lot of viewpoints on the regional situation, including the freedom of navigation, aviation and trade in the East Sea.

The PM noted that more than 3,000 Vietnamese students in New Zealand together with the overseas Vietnamese community are serving as an important bridge to boost the bilateral friendship and cooperation.

He underlined the outcomes of his talks with PM Jacinda Adern, saying the two countries agreed to promote the bilateral comprehensive partnership and soon elevate their relations to a strategic partnership with education being an important pillar.

PM Phuc also introduced the socio-economic situation in Vietnam to the students at Waikato University.

Vietnam has risen to become a middle-income country since 2010, he said, adding that Vietnam is one of the leading exporters of agro-fishery products in the world. 

He told the Waikato students that the coffee they drink everyday could be originated from the coffee beans planted in the red soil of the Central Highlands of Vietnam, and many fruits like mangoes, dragon fruits, rambutans, and lychees sold in the market are Vietnamese tropical specialties.

The PM invited the Waikato students to visit Vietnam - a country with rich culture, a thousand-year history, and the learning tradition.

PM Phuc affirmed that with young people and teenagers accounting for over 40 percent of the population, Vietnam defines developing high-quality human resources as one of the three strategic breakthroughs to become a modern industrial country in the future. Therefore, it will step up cooperation in education to learn from the training models with high applicability like the University of Waikato so as to address its own problems.

It is a fact that the graduate and post-graduate training cooperation models between the University of Waikato and the Hanoi Law University and the Vietnam National University – Ho Chi Minh City are proving fruitful.

At the exchange, he fielded questions about Vietnam’s policy to attract and use talents, especially overseas Vietnamese students with excellent performance. He also answered queries about the development prospect of Vietnam-New Zealand relations after the CPTPP takes effect.

The leader also welcomed the students’ interest in Industry 4.0, adding that Vietnam has made concrete policies to capitalise on achievements of Industry 4.0 to develop its economy.

On this occasion, he witnessed the signing of cooperation documents between the University of Waikato and the Vietnam Social Security and some leading universities of Vietnam. 

Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc (front, first) visits Waikato University

Forty Vietnamese students and 26 graduate ones are studying at the Waikato University, mainly in the majors of economics and education.

The university has training cooperation agreements with the Foreign Education Department of Vietnam’s Ministry of Education and Training, People’s Security Academy of Vietnam’s Ministry of Public Security, and Hanoi Law University.

Later on March 14 (local time), PM Phuc, his spouse and the high-ranking delegation of Vietnam left Auckland, wrapping up the official visit to New Zealand at the invitation of PM Jacinda Ardern.

During the three-day trip, PM Phuc had talks with PM Jacinda Ardern and witnessed the signing of cooperation documents. He held a meeting with Speaker of the House of Representatives Trevor Mallard and phone talks with Governor-General of New Zealand Dame Patsy Reddy. He also met with Mayor of Auckland Phil Goff, attended the Vietnam-New Zealand Business Forum, and received some major businesses of New Zealand. The PM visited the Plant and Food Research of New Zealand and met with students of the University of Waikato and the Auckland University of Technology and Vietnamese people in the country.

At the talks, the two sides agreed on orientations for intensifying the Vietnam-New Zealand comprehensive partnership. They agreed to promote many trade promotion measures, including creating favourable conditions for agricultural and aquatic products, so as to raise bilateral trade to 1.7 billion – 2 billion USD in 2020.

The PMs concurred in increasing the number of Vietnamese students in New Zealand to 30 percent in 2020 through student exchanges, partnering programmes between universities, and other cooperation activities.-VNA