David Haggerty, President of the International Tennis Federation (ITF), is in Vietnam as part of activities to prepare for the ITF’s Conference and Annual General Meeting (AGM) in August.

France’s Choisy le Roi city has offered an insignia to Vietnamese Ambassador to France Nguyen Ngoc Son in recognition of his contributions to developing the France-Vietnam ties in 2016.

 The UI Greenmetric World University Rankings of Indonesia has ranked the Ho Chi Minh City-based Ton Duc Thang University 156 out of 516 sustainable educational facilities worldwide.

 Vietnamese and Cambodian defence ministers signed a cooperation plan for 2017 between the two ministries at their talks on January 9.

 President Tran Dai Quang lauded the effective collaboration between Vietnam’s Public Security Ministry and Cambodia’s Ministry of Home Affairs during a meeting with Cambodian Deputy Prime Minister Samdech Sa Kheng.

 A banquet and music performance was held in Hanoi on January 9 to celebrate the 67th anniversary of the Vietnam – China ties (January 18, 1950-2017) by the Hanoi People’s Committee in collaboration with the Chinese Embassy in Vietnam.

 The Ministry of Public Security maintained a close liaison with Cambodia’s Ministry of Home Affairs to fight crime last year, stated Minister To Lam.

 Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc has affirmed Vietnam’s constant policy of reinforcing the fine neighbourliness, traditional friendship, comprehensive cooperation and long-term sustainability with Cambodia.

 The upcoming visit to China  of Party General Secretary Nguyen Phu Trong from January 12-15 is aimed at further strengthening the Vietnam-China ties and defining the long-term direction for bilateral relations future. 

Projects incurring losses of trillions of dong, personnel scandals and multi-level marketing firms swindling customers were the top issues dominating 2016 for the Ministry of Industry and Trade (MOIT).

VietNamNet Bridge - The owners of large conglomerates such as Novaland, Hoang Huy and Vietjet Air have left the rank of ‘hidden billionaires’ to join the force of recognized stock billionaires.

Vietnamese telcos have geared up to shift from being mobile network operators that provide traditional voice services and SMSs into content service providers in order to seize opportunities from IoT (internet of things).

One of the important issues in the Water Resources Act is the shift from subsidy management to market price management. However, this has raised fears that  agricultural production costs will increase.

VietNamNet Bridge - Students, who are furious about their theses sold on the cheap, have asked for intervention from school management boards.

VietNamNet Bridge - December 31, 2016 was the ‘first death anniversary’ of Deca, an e-commerce site. In 2016, Vietnam’s e-commerce witnessed the departure of another name – Lingo. Many stars in the market faded after a short time of burning bright.

 The Government has issued Resolution 01/NQ-CP detailing key tasks and measures to realize the socio-economic development plan and State budget estimate in 2017.

 While Vietnamese goods find it hard to penetrate the ASEAN market, other countries in the AEC have quickly managed to take advantage of tax cuts to boost their exports to Vietnam. 

 The Ministry of Labour, Invalids and Social Affairs spent VND212bn (USD9.4m) buying training programmes from foreign countries last year.

 Minister of Construction Pham Hong Ha has signed a decision to inspect 12 large real estate companies in 2017.

 A tropical depression is drifting west, north-westerly toward the East Sea, and forecasters say it could potentially become a typhoon and cross-over northern Vietnam later this week.