Vietnam designer applies lacquer to ao dai

As the traditional lacquer craft has gradually fallen into oblivion, Vietnamese designer Nguyen Xuan Thu has been trying to promote this craft by applying it to ao dai (Vietnamese long dress), reports Thanh Nien.

“I want to use the traditional techniques of lacquer to create unique patterns for the costume,” Thu said.

Thu has visited Ha Thai, a popular lacquer village in Thanh Tri District in Hanoi, to seek an artisan for her project. Since she met lacquer artist Tran Hung, both have worked on each and every meticulous stage to add lacquer patterns to ao dai. The process of making the costume is similar to that of a lacquer painting, which requires 40 layers of paint.

Thu, who started her fashion career 15 years ago, expects to launch a collection named Fire which is a combination of lacquer and ao dai in March. The Fire theme of the collection features an image of modern Vietnamese women who has inspiration for work and family.

Tree planting festival launched in Vinh Phuc

President of the Vietnam Fatherland Front Central Committee Nguyen Thien Nhan on February 6 highlighted the significance of a tree-planting festival in the northern province of Vinh Phuc, saying it contributes to environmental protection and socio-economic development.

He said tree planting and forest protection should become a routine for Vietnamese people.

“We plant trees to prevent soil erosion and exhaustion and increase water retention, helping to reduce the aftermaths of floods. Planting trees also makes the air cleaner, increases wood materials, and expands shade for everyone," he said.

On November 28, 1959, President Ho Chi Minh launched the tree-planting festival with the hope that the country would become more beautiful with a more pleasant climate and have a plentiful supply of wood in the next 10 years, the VFF leader said.

With that spirit, on January 1, 1960, at the Thong Nhat (Unification) Park, President Ho Chi Minh and thousands of people in Hanoi organised the first tree-planting festival, he added.

Since then, the festival has become a movement and a good practice of Vietnamese people during the Tet (Lunar New Year) days, contributing to environmental protection and social-economic development.

Nhan suggested the VFFront at all levels need to coordinate with local governments and the agricultural sector to assess the efficiency of tree planting over the past years to take more effective measures for the years to come.

The goal is to make tree planting part of Vietnamese life, bringing practical benefits to socio-economic development in each locality by 2020, the 60th anniversary of the day Uncle Ho launching the tree-planting festival, he noted.

Buon Ma Thuot Coffee Festival to be held in March

A press conference for the annual Buon Ma Thuot Coffee Festival has announced it will run March 3-13 concurrently with the Central Highland Gongs Festival and the fourth Central Highlands Investment Promotion Conference.

At the Festival, there will be a wide range of cultural activities transpiring including a coffee exhibition and fair, investment conference, street festival, and elephant and boat race competition among others.

Minister of Public Security Senior Lieutenant General To Lam, who is heading up the steering committee for the event, said the Gongs Festival is expected to attract a record high 400 professional and amateur artists.

In addition, he said awards would be presented to winners of a photo contest on the Buon Ma Thuot Coffee brand.

Overseas Vietnamese celebrate traditional Tet festival

The Vietnamese Embassy in France has organised a spring festival at the City Hall of Paris in celebration of the traditional Lunar New Year, the biggest festival in Vietnam.

The celebration, the fourth of its kind, was warmed up by a special music performance and a lion dance staged by Vietnamese artists.

Ambassador Nguyen Ngoc Son said the organisation of numerous festivities reflects dynamic relations between Vietnam and France, and contributes to the enhancement of the bilateral strategic partnership.

He added that the embassy will continuously stand side by side with more than 300,000 overseas Vietnamese in France to build a strong community, which well integrates into the host society and contributes effectively to the homeland.

Paris Deputy Mayor Patrick Klugman affirmed that Vietnam is an important partner that has established effective cooperative ties with France in various fields.

The celebration of traditional Lunar New Year at the City Hall helped enrich the cultural diversity in Paris, he said, expressing his belief in a new successful year for Vietnam.

Meanwhile, the General Union of Vietnamese and the Vietnamese Culture Centre in France hosted a Tet celebration for the Vietnamese community in Nogent-sur-Marne city in the outskirts of Paris on February 4.

A Buddhism-themed music festival was held in Prague, the Republic of Czech, on February 5, with the participation of nearly 300 Buddhists.

Vietnamese expatriates from the northern part of Italy along with those living in the areas bordering France and Switzerland also gathered in Milan city to celebrate the Lunar New Year.

Most employees return to work after Tết

Holding a board symbolising lucky money for the New Year, Đặng Thị Thu Thảo smiles brilliantly.

Thảo, a worker at the Thăng Long Plant under Canon Việt Nam in Thăng Long Industrial Zone, said that it was the 16th year she had been given lucky money for the New Year by the company.

“On the first working day of the new year, we meet each other again and everybody is happy and eager. I hope that with every worker’s efforts, the company will develop,” said Thảo.

This year 98.5 per cent of the Canon workers came back to work after the Tết (Lunar New Year) holiday, which ended last week, thanks to the company’s preferential policies for workers.

Phạm Thị Vân Anh, the company’s trade union chairwoman, told the Nông Thôn Ngày Nay (Countryside Today) newspaper that the company hired 180 automobiles to take workers and their families to their hometowns for the holiday.

The company also gave bonuses and presents to employees.

Other companies also welcomed many employees back to work after the holiday.

Samsung Việt Nam restarted operations last Thursday. The company has 100,000 workers, 93 per cent of whom returned to work.

The company did not face worker shortages after the Tết holiday as they implemented preferential policies for workers, said a company representative.

“Besides helping workers to buy coach and train tickets to return to their hometowns, the company gave bonuses to workers. This month, the company increased salary for all workers, and bonuses for those with high productivity,” said the representative.

Nguyễn Đình Thắng, deputy chairman of the Hà Nội Industrial Zone and Processing Zone Trade Union, said that there were no official statistics of employees returning to work after the holiday, but the trade union estimated that more workers cambe back to work than last year.

This was because of co-operation between companies and the trade union in taking care of workers, he said.

Phan Thị Thu Hằng, chairwoman of the Long Biên District Trade Union in Hà Nội, said that taking care of employees and protecting their rights was important.

In Long Biên District, enterprises also took care of their workers’ rights.

Before the holiday, the district trade union arranged 10 automobiles to transport more than 300 workers back to their hometown to enjoy the holiday.

In industrial zones in the northern province of Bắc Giang,  the working atmosphere is also merry.

In the Si Flex Co Ltd in the Quang Châu Industrial Zone in Việt Yên District, nearly 1,000 workers registered to work on the last two days of the old lunar year, and the fourth day of the lunar New Year. Besides salary, the company gave bonuses of VNĐ200,000-400,000 (US$8-16) for each worker per working day during Tết.

Shinsung Vina Co Ltd in Song Khê Industrial Zone in Nội Hoàng District had more than 200 workers working during the holiday with salary of VNĐ1 million ($44) per worker per day.

With appropriate planning before the holiday, on the sixth day of the Lunar New Year the Bắc Giang Garment Company exported two containers of garments worth about US$35,000 to South Korea.

Nguyễn Thị Thu Hương, head of the company’s import-export division, said that after Tết, the company would export goods every day.

In the first month of the lunar New Year, the company aims to hit export turnover of more than $23 million to South Korea, the US, Japan, China and European countries, she said.

The Customs Department managing industrial zones in the province said that during Tết, about 10 foreign-direct investment enterprises came to the department to register for import-export activities.

Work also kicked off again after the festivities in the northern province of Quảng Ninh,.

Đặng Văn Chính, chairman of the Trade Union of Quảng Ninh Industrial Zones, said that this year most workers returned to work on the first working day after the holiday, because many companies arranged automobiles to transport workers to their hometown before the holiday, and bring them back after the holiday.

Some companies gave most of the Tet bonus to their workers before the holiday, and gave the remainder if they came back to work immediately after the holiday.

“This makes employees work harder and be eager to work after the holiday,” said Chính.

The same situation occurred in HCM City.

Trần Anh Tuấn, deputy director of the HCM Centre for Forecasting Manpower Needs and Labour Market Information, told the Tiền Phong (Vanguard) newspaper that most enterprises implemented good salary and bonus policies, so the rate of worker shortages after Tết was low.

Surveys of more than 1,700 enterprises in the city showed that the labour market after the holiday was stable, he said.

“Companies’ social welfare policies were good, limiting the number of workers quitting their jobs. Therefore, demand for new workers this year is lower than previous years,” said Tuấn. – VNS

Poor people encouraged to join health insurance

Roughly 17 million or more than 18 per cent of Việt Nam’s population had not entered the health insurance programme by the end of 2016. Most were labourers, poor people and students, the Việt Nam Social Insurance (VNSI) has said.

A report from the agency showed that more than 81 per cent people were covered by health insurance in 2016, equivalent to 75 million people and 4.3 per cent more than 2015.

Of the total, only 74,000 people from business households of agriculture, forestry, fishery and salt production have insurance, only 4.5 per cent of the total population of this group.

The main reason for this, the agency said, was enterprises who evaded paying insurance premiums for workers. Meanwhile, supervision of social and health insurance regulations remained poor.

Co-operation between sectors in localities in implementing health insurance was also ineffective, leading to difficulties in providing more people with insurance.

Nguyễn Thị Minh, VNSI General Director said that the Law on Healthcare Insurance and its benefit to insurance buyers has encouraged people to join the programme.

However, Minh said, to make the Ministry of Health’s 90 per cent target for health coverage by 2020 feasible, it was necessary to alter mechanisms.

For example, some poor people living on islands and in coastal areas have not renewed their insurance cards after being given them two years ago, according to the official.

Minh said the VNSI has opened more branches to expand health insurance nationwide. It has simplified administrative procedures for granting insurance cards to help people sign up for insurance.

Currently, 62 out of 63 cities and provinces have achieved national targets for insurance coverage. About 18 localities managed to have 90 per cent of people covered by health insurance.  

The lowest coverage rate of 68 per cent was Bình Thuận Province.

Two-day-old infant saved from blood hump

Doctors of HCM City-based Paediatrics Hospital No.1 successfully saved the life of a two-day-old infant by removing a giant hematoma from his body.

Dr Phạm Thị Thanh Tâm, head of the hospital’s Infant Recovery Department, said the 2.5kg boy was rushed to hospital on February 1 with black blood birthmarks on his whole body and a big hematoma in the right thigh along with symptoms of brain haemorrhage. 

“After checking and testing the hump, we found that the hematoma had swelled rapidly and was sucking blood from the infant’s body, possibly with a high risk of fatality,” Dr Tâm said.

The immediate treatment was to look for suitable blood type for blood transfusion. The difficulty was the blood had to be fresh to be transfused to the infant’s body. Blood stored for a long time could not be used.

“Wrong blood type could result in blood disorder and pose a higher risk of death. There was a lack of voluntary blood donors during the Tết (Lunar New Year) holiday so we had to call for help from blood banks and the city’s hospitals to look for a matching blood source,” Tâm said.

Following a four-hour surgery conducted by doctors of various departments on February 3, a 10-12cm hematoma was removed.

The infant is still using a respiratory machine; however, there is no bleeding anymore. The brain haemorrhage, according to doctors, does not appear to be too serious as the boy’s brain is reacting to movements.

However, Dr Tâm said the hematoma could possibly grow again because this was an innate defect of unknown origin.

Every year, HCM City-based Paediatrics Hospital No.1 receives some 15 to 20 children suffering from the hematoma disease. The two-day infant is the hospital’s youngest hematoma patient, hospitalised in extremely critical condition. 

Commuters start paying to use BRT from Monday

Commuters in Hà Nội have to pay to use the bus rapid transit (BRT) service from Monday, after enjoying free rides for more than a month.

An estimated 380,000 people travelled free of charge on the BRT in January, the first month the new public transport service was operated in the capital.

The bus runs on a 14-km route from Kim Mã Street to Yên Nghĩa Bus Station, completing the journey in 30 to 45 minutes. The BRT buses offer passengers complimentary Wi-Fi service.

From Monday, each trip will cost VNĐ7,000 (US$0.3), which is the same rate as the non-BRT buses, which are partially subsidised by the Government.

Nguyễn Hoànng Hải, director of Hà Nội Public Transport Management and Operation Centre, said that while during the first half of January, many people were using BRT buses simply to experience it, by the second half of the month, commuters using the BRT were those who really needed to travel along the route.

“On the first day that people have to buy BRT tickets, the number of passengers remains the same,” he said.

Several types of commuters get concessional rates, including students, workers in industrial zones and senior citizens, who have to pay VNĐ55,000 ($2.43) a month for fixed route and VNĐ100,000 ($4.25) a month for multi-route. Others have to pay VNĐ100,000 and VNĐ200,000 per month, respectively.

Hải said the monthly fares are inexpensive and that if the BRT can ensure good quality of service, frequency and timing, it will attract more commuters.

Nguyễn Thủy, director of Hà Nội BRT Factory, said the number of passengers on Monday did not change compared to the previous days, which suggests that the service has been well-received.

Commuter Trần Thu Trang said she prefers travelling by BRT to her office on Láng Hạ Street as it takes less time than by motorbike. The BRT fare is the same as other buses, but it is far more convenient and much faster, she said.

From this month, the traffic police have also started imposing fines on motorists caught driving in the dedicated BRT lane. Following Government Decree 46/2016/NĐ-CP, issued in 2016, automobiles driving in the BRT lane will be fined VNĐ800,000-1.2 million ($35-53) and motorbikes VNĐ300,000-400,000 ($13-17).

The city plans to operate eight BRT routes by 2030.

Health Ministry helps provinces curb lead contamination

The National Institute of Occupational and Environmental Health under the Health Ministry has conducted a health examination on Vietnamese people who are highly exposed to lead.

The purpose of the examination is to help them reduce the risk of lead contamination and poisoning.

This month the institute took blood samples of 60 children in Phú Xá Ward in northern Thái Nguyên City of Thái Nguyên Province to determine the level of lead.

Last month children with exposure to lead in Đồng Hỷ District in Thái Nguyên Province and Chợ Đồn District in northern Bắc Kạn Province also underwent testing.

It is part of a research being conducted by the institute on lead poisoning of Vietnamese children. The research focuses on assessing environment situation, its impact on children’s health and mapping out measures.

The research was conducted in localities which have mine ores, metallurgy, recycling and make lead-containing waste, such as Hưng Yên, Thái Nguyên and Bắc Kạn provinces.

Following testing results, the institute will instruct locals to take intervening and preventive measures against lead poisoning.

The institute has also worked with local medical facilities to disseminate knowledge to raise local awareness on culprits and the impacts of lead on health.

According to a representative of the National Institute of Occupational and Environmental Health, sources of lead pollution originate from mining, metallurgy, recycling and the use of lead in paint and petrol.

Children are the most vulnerable to lead poisoning, which may result in serious and long-term consequences, especially the impact on the development of a child’s brain and nerve system. Lead also poses a threat to adults, such as the risk of high blood pressure and kidney failure.

Dr Doãn Ngọc Hải, head of the National Institute of Occupational and Environmental Health, said the release of lead can be done but is unsustainable. Following the release, children return to live in the lead-polluted environment and are exposed to lead again.

She advised residents not to be lured by economic benefits and ignore their health, in addition to suggesting planning of lead recycling villages.

The Natural Resources and Environment Ministry’s latest nationwide survey of 52 handicraft villages has revealed that 46 per cent of them are severely polluting the area’s air, water and land, as well as causing noise pollution.

The survey also shows that people who live in or near such craft villages are at higher risk of suffering from respiratory problems, cancer and mental ailments. 

Violating coach operators forced to halt operations

Coach operators who are not following changes in the bus routes as instructed by the Hà Nội’s transport authority would be forced to halt operations for a month.

This was stated by Hà Huy Quang, deputy director of the city’s Department of Transport.

By Friday, the department would re-examine the implementation of the changes by coach operators at bus stations in the city. Violators would have their operation badges revoked for a month, he said.

He made the statement after trans-provincial coach operators refused to take on passengers at Mỹ Đình Bus Station as a way of protest against the route changes by the department.

According to the department’s plan, coach routes linking the city with the northern provinces of Thái Bình and Nam Định and the central provinces of Hà Tĩnh, Thanh Hoá and Nghệ An would be requested to move the departure point from Mỹ Đình to Nước Ngầm Bus Station, which was nearly 15 kilometres away.

The changes were aimed at reducing congestion and came into effect on January 2.

Previously, the city’s department had asked provincial departments to inform bus companies of the changes and told transport companies to co-ordinate closely with relevant offices and station management boards to urgently finalise contracts with the new stations.

Currently, as many as 12 transport enterprises have not changed their departure points as regulated.

In December, the department announced changes in bus routes from Hà Nội to other localities. Bus routes from the city to the provinces of Đắk Lắk and Gia Lai in the Central Highlands, Hà Tĩnh, Nghệ An in the central region, and Nam Định, Thái Bình, Thanh Hoá and Ninh Bình in the north, would move to Nước Ngầm Station. Currently, buses leave from six different stations -- Mỹ Đình, Gia Lâm, Yên Nghĩa and Sơn Tây, as well as Trôi and Phùng.        

Bus routes linking the city with the northern provinces of Bắc Kạn, Cao Bằng, Hà Giang and Lai Châu, as well as Lào Cai, Phú Thọ, Quảng Nam, Thái Nguyên, Tuyên Quang, Vĩnh Phúc, and Yên Bái would be shifted to Mỹ Đình Station.     

Routes linking the city with the provinces of Bà Rịa-Vũng Tàu in the south, Kon Tum and Đắk Nông in the Central Highland, and Điện Biên, Hoà Bình and Thanh Hoá in the north would be transferred from Mỹ Đình, Giáp Bát and Nước Ngầm to Yên Nghĩa Station.

Passengers to the northern provinces of Hà Nam, Hải Dương, Hải Phòng and Hưng Yên would depart from Giáp Bát Station in the south of the city, while those going to the provinces of Bắc Giang and Lạng Sơn would depart from Gia Lâm Station. 

Gov’t initiates electronic health insurance cards

The Government has asked the Việt Nam Social Security (VSS) to conduct research to issue electronic health insurance cards to citizens.

VSS will utilise technologies to connect social security offices in 63 provinces and create centralised social security databases for the country, with a vision to conducting electronic transactions for the declaration, remittance and settlement procedures of social insurance, health insurance and unemployment insurance.

VSS will also work on integrating all social insurance, health insurance and unemployment insurance information onto one electronic card.

The technologies will also help hospitals and clinics connect with VSS and track health insurance information of patients to provide them with appropriate health insurance coverage.

Some 75 million citizens nationwide joined health insurance by the end of last year, covering 81 per cent of the total population, exceeding the assigned rate of 2.8 per cent and increasing by 4.3 per cent compared with 2015.

The remaining 17 million citizens are those who either have not joined health insurance or paid only a part of the insurance. They include three million labourers working for enterprises, 0.4 million members of economically challenged households and three million students.

Construction of airport flyovers set to start

Construction of two flyovers to ease traffic around HCM City’s Tan Son Nhat Airport will start on February 8, the municipal Department of Transport has said.

A Y-shaped concrete flyover costing 242 billion VND (10.7 million USD) will be built at the Truong Son Street intersection that links it with the airport.

It will have two branches, one 303 metres long and going into the international terminal. The other, 153 metres long, will link the domestic terminal.

A giant steel flyover will come up above the Nguyen Thai Son-Nguyen Kiem intersection in Go Vap district.

It will be N-shaped with three separate arms and cost around 504 billion VND (22.2 million USD).

A 362-metre section will connect Hoang Minh Giam and Nguyen Thai Son streets. A second, 367m arm will turn north from Hoang Minh Giam into Nguyen Kiem Street. Another 367m arm will turn south from Nguyen Thai Son Street into Nguyen Kiem.

Besides, the roads around the Nguyen Thai Son - Nguyen Kiem Intersection will be widened to ease the flow of traffic.

More than 30,000 vehicles pass the airport area every day in addition to those of over 10,000 airport staff.

This year many passengers were late for their flights during Tet because of gridlock.

Transport ministry seeks delay to emission standard upgrade

Vietnam’s Ministry of Transport has called on the government to postpone a mandatory European emission standard upgrade for new road vehicles in the country, citing unpreparedness, despite it having been given a five-year window for preparation.

In 2011, the government issued a resolution stipulating that all types of new cars to be used in Vietnam, both imported and domestically assembled, must meet the Euro 4 exhaust emission standard, instead of the lower Euro 2, from January 1, 2017.

The mandatory upgrade, from Euro 2 to Euro 3, was also approved for motorbikes with the same deadline.

Currently applied in several countries, the Euro emission standards, set by the European Union, stipulate the average emission targets for such toxic substances as carbon monoxide (CO) or carbon dioxide (CO2) that new road vehicles must meet.

The Euro 2, introduced in 1997, set the CO emission target at 4g/kWh, and the later Euro 4, effective in 2011, lowered the ratio to 1.5g/kWh.

Even though ministries and relevant sectors had more than five years to prepare and make necessary changes to follow the compulsory upgrade, the transport ministry called for a deadline extension for several kinds of vehicles in a document submitted to the government in mid-January.

The transport ministry said it was not immediately possible in terms of technology to manufacture new vehicles that meet the Euro 4 standard, thus asking to be given “more time for preparation.”

The ministry wanted to delay the Euro 4 upgrade for several diesel-powered vehicles, including passenger cars, pickup trucks and vans, to January 1, 2018, and to as late as January 1, 2022 for other trucks that also run on diesel.

As for motorbikes and vehicles using gasoline, biofuel, liquefied petroleum and natural gas, the transport ministry said manufacturers should follow the upgrade deadline.

Diesel-fueled passenger cars and trucks are popular in Vietnam and known as the main cause of street pollution.

The transport ministry said most manufacturers of those means of transportation in Vietnam have yet to obtain the Euro 4 certificate as they are making products reaching lower standards, hoping that the government would change its mind on the mandatory upgrade.

As of December 31, 2016, only six types of car engines had been certified as meeting the Euro 4 standard, according to the ministry.

In the meantime, it is also an issue for the standardized vehicles to find qualified fuel to run on in Vietnam.

A petrol product must have a maximum lead content of 0.005 grams per liter to achieve the Euro 4 standard, compared to 0.013 g/l of the Euro 2.

However, Dung Quat Refinery, Vietnam’s only operational oil refinery that currently meets some 30 percent of the domestic fuel demand, is unable to produce such standardized petrol products, its operator BSR has admitted.

“Our facility was designed in 1999 and commissioned in 2009, whereas the Euro 4 was introduced in 2011,” BSR chairman Nguyen Hoang Giang told Tuoi Tre (Youth) newspaper.

The refinery needs to be expanded and upgraded to be able to produce the Euro 4-level fuel, Giang said.

“The upgrade and expansion may finish in 2022 or 2023, after which we will be able to produce fuel products that meet even the Euro 5 standard,” Giang claimed, adding that the facility’s products now satisfy the Euro 3 standard only.

According to the transport ministry, the Vietnam Automobile Manufacturers' Association has also cited the lack of proper fuel to call for a delay to the Euro 4 upgrade, saying “car engines will break down easier without suitable fuel.”

With the transport ministry’s petition effectively meaning vehicles living up to low emission standards would be allowed to continue running in Vietnam, some environment agencies are not pleased.

Professor Pham Ngoc Dang, deputy head of the Vietnam Association for Conservation of Nature and Environment (VACNE), said the ministry’s request is unreasonable, given the five-year window relevant entities were given to prepare for the upgrade.

“Delaying the emission standard upgrade is going against the goal of sustainable and environment-friendly development and worsens the current emission pollution, which is already at an alarming rate, in cities and provinces countrywide,” Prof. Dang underlined.

The professor said car and motorbike exhaust emissions currently account for 70% of the air pollution in urban areas across Vietnam, so “instead of being put off, the upgrade implementation should be sped up.”

Vietnam now has some 2.5 million automobiles, 1.5 million of which are trucks and passenger cars using diesel fuel, according to statistics obtained by Tuoi Tre.

With this number increasing by 200,000 units per year, some experts are concerned that failing to mandate higher emission standards for new vehicles would lead to worse environmental pollution.

Chinese passenger fined for threatening Vietnam Airlines crewmember

He had an economy ticket but reportedly demanded a business seat and started a scene during his flight early this month.

Vietnam’s aviation authority has decided to fine a Chinese passenger for insulting and threatening a crewmember on a Vietnam Airlines flight from Beijing to Hanoi.

The fine for Liu Jun, 48, was VND7.5 million (US$3,300), according to a report from Tuoi Tre newspaper.

The in-flight incident happened on February 1. Liu, who had an economy ticket, left his seat and asked a crewmember to move him to business class. As the crewmember denied his request, the passenger reportedly shouted, insulted and threatened to beat the crewmember, whose identity has not been disclosed.

Liu also threatened two other passengers who tried to calm him down.

He was fined after the plane landed at Noi Bai airport in Hanoi.

China is one of the most important feeder markets for Vietnam's tourism industry.

Arrivals from China in January increased 67.9% from a year ago to 247,621 visitors, accounting for a quarter of Vietnam’s total international tourist number, according to the General Statistics Office.

The number of Chinese tourists hit 2.5 million last year, out of the total 10 million visitors, according to the Vietnam National Administration of Tourism.

Fishermen in Mekong River Delta celebrate Whale Worshipping Festival

Tens of thousands of fishermen in cities and provinces across the Mekong River Delta region flocked to Bac Lieu province to attend the traditional Whale Worshipping Festival, which opened in Vinh Thinh commune, Hoa Binh district on February 5.

The festival is observed annually on the ninth day of the first lunar month to convey the fishermen’s wishes for favourable weather, safe trips and generous catches.

At 8 AM on Sunday morning, dozens of fishing boats, which were decorated with flowers and flags, headed off to sea to join a procession. The procession was then followed by an offering ceremony, which was led by elders of the village.

Also yesterday morning, a spring festival kicked off at Tan Thanh pagoda in Lang Son province as a starting event of the provincial Cultural and Tourism Week.

The festival featured arts performances, lion dance and martial arts performances, attracting the participation of thousands of locals and visitors.

On the same day, residents in An Xuan commune, Tuy An district, Phu Yen province eagerly joined a traditional horse racing event, which saw competition between 32 horsemen from towns and communes in the district.

The event is unique as the participating horses are work horses owned by local people while the horsemen are farmers rather than professional riders.

Transport minister requires upgrading of some Tan Son Nhat Airport items not broadening

Minister of Transport Truong Quang Nghia yesterday instructed relevant agencies to rationalize and upgrade some items at Tan Son Nhat International Airport to increase flight operations performance instead of expanding the airport.

At a meeting on the airport’s plan adjustment in the phase from now until 2020, minister Truong Quang Nghia said that the airport expansion would meet with many problems including huge site clearance costs.
 
After analyzing all factors, he concluded that some items at the airport should be upgraded and rationalized to reduce the time which aircrafts have to wait in the air to land on runways. This year, he proposed relevant agencies to improve aircraft parking yards and runways.
 
Tan Son Nhat Airport capacity should not increase more than 40 million passengers a year as per proposals by consultant units because Long Thanh International Airport will serve 25 million passengers a year after coming into operation in 2023-2025.

Jetstar Pacific opens Hanoi-Buon Ma Thuot air route

Vietnamese low- cost carrier Jetstar Pacific yesterday announced that its new domestic air route linking Hanoi and Buon Ma Thuot city of Dak Lak will be launched on March 9.

The airline will exploit three return flights a week falling on Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday, using a 180-seat Airbus A320.
 
The carrier sells cheap one-way tickets starting from VND 290,000.
 
This is the 38th air routes of Jetstar Pacific, meeting demands for travel, economic and tourism development of the localities.

VNA/VNS/VOV/SGT/SGGP/TT/TN/Dantri/VNE