Baby girl born with record weight of 6kg

Tien Giang General Hospital greeted its biggest ever new-born baby girl after a successful operation last Friday. The 6kg-baby was born following a 20 minute surgery performed by Doctor Dang Van Phuc, the hospital's deputy head.

Mother Tran Thi Phuong, 29, gave birth to a son who weighed 4.2kg in 2006.

Phuc said mother and daughter were doing well but due to her weight, the baby would remain in hospital under observation for four or five days.

Spinal specialists hold training in Nha Trang

More than 40 back specialists from Viet Nam, Japan and the United States participated at the second international spinal cord conference in southern Khanh Hoa Province's Nha Trang City last Saturday.

The participants introduced a variety of new techniques on spinal treatment. The conference was held under an agreement between Khanh Hoa General Hospital, HCM City Vertebral Column Association and the American Association of Spinal Endoscopy. It was aimed at helping Vietnamese specialists in this area update their theory and practice of spinal surgery.

To highlight new breakthroughs, 23 American doctors and technicians and two Japanese doctors joined their Vietnamese counterparts and operated on eight patients suffering from deformed spinal cords at Khanh Hoa General Hospital.

Two men jailed for forgery and fraud

Tran Van Minh, 25, former director of the Viet Nam TMP Technology JSC, and Cam Long Tho, 30, a resident of Dong Da District in Ha Noi, have been charged with forgery and fraud and appeared in court Thursday.
Minh and Tho were alleged to have faked the signature of Vo Hong Khanh, Ha Noi's People's Committee Vice Chairman on all paperwork stating their company had been awarded the management rights of a large building project on Tran Duy Hung Street in city's Cau Giay District.

Rescuers continue hunt for fisherman missing at sea

In a busy week for Viet Nam's marine rescue services, several more fishing vessels ran into trouble last Saturday.
In the first incident, the eight crew members of vessel BTh 5525 TS needed an escort back to southern Ba Ria - Vung Tau Province after their boat crashed into an oil container.

The captain of the boat Pham Nhung said his son Pham Cong Lap had fallen from the boat in the collision and he was still missing.

The Maritime Rescue Co-ordination Centre (MRCC) in Vung Tau immediately assigned its ship Star 413 to search for him.

On the same day, the boat BTh 0601 TS ran into technical difficulties. It was later detected and the vessel and its six crew members were expected home soon.

In a separate incident on Saturday, a fishing vessel rescued an unconscious sailor and took him to Con Dao District's Ben Dam Port.

Once recovered, the sailor said he had been on board BV 4248 TS, which had sunk when fishing in waters off the district. He said the rest of the 22-man crew was still missing.

Singapore's Kota Restu and Bahamas' Hyperio are now assisting the MRCC in Vung Tau with rescue efforts.

The National Research and Rescue Committee has also directed naval forces to help with the search and rescue.

In yet another incident, the 24-horsepower fishing boat TTH 40498 capsized in fierce waves in the central Thua Thien- Hue Province. One crew member was alive and the other four were missing.

"When the boat capsized, we were just one nautical mile away from the shore, all of us decided to swim to the shore but after a while, I was alone," said survivor Nguyen Duan.

Pilot programme reaps results in new rural areas

Many provinces and cities have built new rural areas, achieving significant results, including improved infrastructure, new farming production models and higher incomes.

In 2008 the Government chose 11 communes nationwide to participate in a national pilot programme to build new rural areas.

In HCM City's Cu Chi District, the living standards of people in Tan Thong Hoi Commune, which is one of 11 communes under the national pilot programme, have risen.

In addition, the poverty rate fell from 22 per cent to 12.4 per cent in June, according to the HCM City Statistics Bureau.

As of June, the commune had fulfilled 12 of the 19 criteria set under the programme, including those related to transport, irrigation, housing, poverty, and political and social security. It targets fulfilling the remaining criteria next year.

Over the past years, in many provinces and cities, local authorities and residents have built new rural areas by developing transport infrastructure and farming production models.

Hau Giang Province, for example, built new rural areas in 2006-10.

At the end of August, the Hau Giang Province People's Committee recognised three communes, Vi Thanh in Vi Thuy District, Vinh Vien in Long My District and Tan Tien in Vi Thanh District, which have met 13 of 19 criteria set under the programme.

In Vi Thanh Commune, the per capita annual income has reached nearly VND15 million (US$780), two times more than in 2006.

Providing junior high school education for all youth, as well as extended vaccinations for children, which are two of the criteria, have reached 100 per cent in Vi Thanh Commune.

Similarly, Bac Lieu Province's Phuoc Long District has built new rural areas, restructuring its farming production by diversifying plant cultivation and animal husbandry.

The district has mobilised all sectors to build infrastructure systems.

The capital for constructing public projects has been raised from the State and the community.

All roads in the district's communes have been paved and the district's per capita annual income has climbed to VND15.5 million, up 2.5 times compared to 2005.

Still, investing in new farm production models has been the most difficult task in building new rural areas, according to the Central Steering Committee for the national programme of building new rural areas.

The committee has also asked the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development and provincial steering committees to invest more money for the development of agricultural production models in rural areas.

Nguyen Phong Quang, deputy head of the Steering Committee for the Southwestern Region, said: "Developing production, improving income and changing the labour structure in rural areas cannot be done in a short time and it needs to be implemented over the long term."

Huynh Minh Doan, former secretary of the Dong Thap Province's Party Committee, said rural residents played a leading role in the process of building new rural areas.

"Besides the investment of the central and local governments, the task of building new rural areas at the commune level is based on the community," Doan said.

"It is important to raise the solidarity and awareness of people in implementing the programme," he added.

In August, the Government launched the national programme on building new rural areas in all communes nationwide for the 2010-20 period, with a target of reaching 50 per cent of communes that will meet the 19 criteria by 2020.

It also targets transferring more agricultural labourers to other sectors to reduce the national farming workforce to 30 per cent by 2020. It represented 51.9 per cent of the workforce in 2009.

Source: VNS