The National Assembly will begin Question-&-Answer activities in the afternoon of June 7, starting with agriculture and rural development issues.   

The questions are expected to focus on the organisation of production in combination with markets for agricultural products; and coordination in building mechanisms, policies on trade promotion, negotiations on market opening for Vietnamese farm produce.

The deputies will also inquire into measures to control price fluctuations regarding some agriculture and fishery products, animal feed and agricultural materials, the simplification of administrative procedures, the attraction of investment in agriculture, hi-tech application in agriculture, and response to climate change.

The main person to answer the questions will be the Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development. Besides, Deputy Prime Minister Le Van Thanh and the ministers of some other ministries will field questions on issues related to areas under their management.

The Q&A session will be broadcast live on national TV and radio.

VN to face Japan in Futsal Asian Cup

Việt Nam are in Group D at the 2022 Asian Football Confederation (AFC) Futsal Cup which will be held in Kuwait between September 25 and October 20.

At the 17th edition event, which was previously known as the AFC Futsal Championship, a total of 16 teams will compete in four groups.

In Group D, Việt Nam are with South Korea, Saudi Arabia and powerhouse Japan.Kuwait, Iraq, Thailand and Oman make up Group A; Uzbekistan, Bahrain, Tajikistan and Turkmenistan Group B; and Iran, Lebanon, Taiwan (China) and Indonesia Group C.

The team will not have head coach Phạm Minh Giang, who plans to take part in a training course in Spain. The team will instead welcome an Argentinean coach to guide them in the Asian Cup.

The name of the coach has not been revealed but it is said he is Diego Giustozzi, who led Argentina to win the World Cup trophy in 2016.

The new coach, whose contract with Elpozo Murcia FC of Spain will end this month, will arrive in Việt Nam with an assistant in August.

Poor urban development cause of flooding, congestion in HCM City: experts

Experts have called on HCM City to improve urban planning to mitigate pressing problems like flooding and traffic congestion.

“Poorly planned urban development” is to blame for the many problems faced by the country’s largest city, they said.

Urban development can change the environment through, for example, expanding paved areas and preventing rainwater from being absorbed by the soil, increasing flooding, especially in low-lying areas, they pointed out.

Architect Ngô Viết Nam Sơn said the growing concentration of people and construction works are among the causes of the city’s congestion and flooding. “The city has focused too much urban development in its inner areas,” he said.

It needs to develop clusters of urban areas instead of focusing too much on the downtown, he said. “The lack of green spaces and water bodies is another cause.” For instance, poor solid-waste management could block rainwater and sewage drains, leading to waterlogging and flooding, he said.

The city should reduce the density of social infrastructure in its central areas and increase green spaces and water bodies there, he said. He also said underground spaces in the central area require reservoirs to store rainwater to prevent flooding. 

Dr Hồ Long Phi said it is important to improve the capacity of the sewer system, create reservoirs to store rainwater and dredge canals to keep tides low. “But the cost of anti-flood works is so high that the city cannot afford it and it requires private investment.” 

The poor regulation of construction of apartment buildings and inadequate waste management could be another reason for flooding, he said.

It should be made mandatory for property developers to increase green spaces and water surface areas to increase water storage and drainage capacity to prevent flooding, he added.

Doctors warn on risk of 'imported malaria' from Africa with borders reopening

Doctors at Hà Nội's Bạch Mai Hospital have warned of the risk of malaria from Africa as the hospital's Centre for Tropical Diseases is treating two malaria patients who returned from Angola recently.

For many years, Hà Nội and the northern provinces have had almost no malaria patients, so the timely detection, diagnosis and treatment of malaria cases returning from abroad in grass-roots health facilities is difficult and easily missed.

According to Associated Professor Đỗ Duy Cường, the centre's director, both patients developed fever right after returning to Việt Nam, but the healthcare facilities at the grass-roots level did not pay attention to the epidemiological factor that they had been in Africa, so they did not detect the disease.

Due to the rampant atypical malaria symptoms, it was easy to confuse with other diseases such as flu, COVID-19, dengue fever, or urinary infection, Cường said.

Cường added: "In recent years, malaria in Việt Nam had been controlled quite successfully because we had effective malaria control programmes in localities and adequate malarial medicines, so the rates of infection and mortality from the disease had decreased significantly."

Malaria situation in HCM City

HCM City’s Hospital for Tropical Diseases last week reported that the unit has received and treated two imported cases of severe malaria.

These are the first cases of malaria recorded in the city in recent years.

One of the two patients is a 24-year-old Vietnamese student who returned from Cameroon. The other is a 63-year-old Chinese man, who travelled to the city from Ivory Coast.

According to doctor Hồ Đặng Trung Nghĩa, head of the hospital’s Department of Infectious Diseases, both patients came from Africa where malaria is still endemic.

Nghĩa recommends that people who return from malaria-endemic areas such as Laos, Cambodia, and Africa or those who have had malaria before, need to go to medical facilities for examination and testing if they have a fever. 

Police crack down on overloaded vehicles

A one-month crackdown on overloaded vehicles across the country will begin on June 15, the Ministry of Transport (MOT) has announced. 

The campaign has come about after a number of overloaded vehicles with widened trunks have damaged roads in different provinces and cities.

The Directorate for Roads of Việt Nam (DRVN) said that despite many measures, such as mobile weighing stations and portable scales for inspectors, overloaded vehicles are still damaging roads and causing traffic accidents, especially on routes around cement manufacture plants and construction material ports.

In Hà Nội, along the Highways 32, 21 and 6, inspectors found lorries with trunks extended by up to three times their original design, transporting construction materials.

Police on duty along the highways said that keeping overloaded vehicles off the road was their main duty. But, the roads leading to ports and construction sites were often quite remote, making it difficult to find all offenders. 

In the period 2016-21, inspectors of the transport sector checked more than 2.7 million vehicles, and more than 307,000 of them were fined a total of VNDD2.3 trillion (US$98.5 million) for weighing violations. 

In this month's campaign, the MOT asked concerned organisations to improve inspections, focus on coordination between transport inspectors and local authorities, closely check vehicles at ports, and also complete a legal framework for the issue in which applying information technology in the work. The campaign will be conducted in northern provinces first. 

Thousands of volunteers join hands to clean up Viet Nam

Starting in 2020, the campaign Clean Up Việt Nam has been calling for people to pick up trash from various locations in the country, aiming to raise awareness on reducing plastic waste, protecting the environment, and moving the community towards a greener lifestyle.

To mark World Environment Day this year, parents and their children like Thúy’s family, as well as students in universities and high schools, were eager to join the campaign in Hà Nội despite the mid-summer heat.

After distributing garbage mitts and recycled sacks to collect the trash, the group started walking around the area and got down to work. 

Outside their gathering point at the foot of an apartment complex on Nguyễn Hoàng Tôn Street, a moat-like structure has gradually turned into a makeshift landfill with domestic waste, discarded doors and plaster pieces from house renovation work. Old car parts and tires from the motor repair shops across the street also littered the area.

According to a 2019 report by the Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment, daily municipal waste increased from 32,000 tons in 2014 to 35,624 tons in 2019, accounting for more than 50 per cent of the national solid waste. 

The amount of plastic waste also skyrocketed during the pandemic, putting further pressure on Việt Nam’s limited waste management systems.

Joining the campaign that spans 63 cities and provinces, the volunteers hope to be part of the continuous effort to relieve this pressure. 

Dominican man jailed for murdering Vietnamese student

A man convicted of murdering a Vietnamese student in Japan has been jailed for 12 years. 

Brian Alberto Cabrera Cruz, from the Dominican Republic, initially denied killing the 21-year-old claiming he was attacked first and was acting in self defence. 

But the Osaka prefecture’s Prosecutor Office pointed to evidence that showed the defendant intentionally attacked the victim who was not resisting. Cruz, 27, then pushed the man into the river.

The office recommended that the defendant should be sentenced to 18 years in prison.

After deliberation, the presiding judge of the trial concluded that although at first, the defendant had "legitimate defence," however, he continued attacking the victim and did not stop his behaviour even though the victim did not have the ability to resist, and then he deliberately pushed the victim into the river.

It was an act of violence that was more than necessary for self-defence, it was ruled, and  pushing him into the river was a major factor in the death.

On that basis, the court sentenced the defendant to 12 years in prison, six years lower than the sentence proposed by the prosecutor's office.

On August 2, 2021, Cruz, who was unemployed and had no permanent address, beat the Vietnamese student then pushed him into the Dotonbori River in the Namba Parks area, which caused him to die.

According to local police, he appeared to have drunk alcohol with the student near the scene before the incident took place.

Three days later, the Osaka Prefectural Police arrested Cruz and charged him with murder. 

HCMC to pilot extracting digital civil status documents in June

The Ho Chi Minh City Department of Information and Communications yesterday cooperated with the HCMC Justice Department to hold a virtual meeting about the pilot of using digital civil status data in the city from June 15.

Deputy Director of the HCMC Justice Department Nguyen Van Vu informed that from June 15, the city will issue extracts of marriage certificates, birth certificates, death certificates, and parent-child acknowledgements using the digitized data of civil status books in the city’s shared databases, regardless of the registration or storing place.

This is expected to bring great convenience to citizens since they do not need waste time coming back to the original locations for these personal documents.

The Deputy Director stressed that this is one important step for HCMC to issue digital versions of civil status documents in accordance with Circular No.01/2022 by the Justice Ministry on detailing certain content and measures to apply Decree No.87/2020 (by the Government on digital civil status databases and online civil status registration).

The pilot is a premise for the city to widely exploit the digital civil status data to simplify administrative procedures for better services. It is also a part of the city plan to establish shared foundation databases in order to fulfill the digital transformation mission of HCMC.

To pilot this document extraction, the city has finished the first phase in digitizing 12.8 million civil status documents for all city dwellers (marriage certificates, birth certificates, death certificates, and parent-child acknowledgements), while linking its databases to the national one, managed by the Justice Ministry.

Therefore, at present, residents can visit any ward offices in the city to ask for extracts of the above civil status papers easily.

HCMC resolutely handle violation related to blood donors

Vice Chairman of Ho Chi Minh City People’s Committee Duong Anh Duc yesterday requested that the HCMC Health Department, HCMC Red Cross Society, and the HCMC Public Security Department cooperate to investigate the reported violation in blood donation at the HCMC Heart Institute, published on newspaper lately.

Accordingly, the mentioned state units are asked to carefully examine related individuals or organizations for possible law violation at the HCMC Heart Institute and report to the Standing Committee of HCMC People’s Committee by June 10.

Before this, there was an article on newspaper about Hoang Trong An, who disguised himself as a charity worker and requested families of pediatric heart surgery patients to pay from VND1-3 million (US$43-129) as a gift for blood donors. In fact, this amount was never delivered to the donors but was kept for himself.

Director of the HCMC Health Department Tang Chi Thuong informed that he has already directed inspectors in his department to work with the HCMC Heart Institute for a thorough investigation of the reported news. He also displayed a determination to fight against those taking advantage of charity activities for their own profit. If there is a signal of selling donated blood like it was reported, his unit will properly handle it.

The HCMC Health Department will also collaborate with HCMC Red Cross Society to verify personal information and job positions of individuals mentioned in the news article.

Dr. Bui Minh Trang, Director of HCMC Heart Institute, admitted the blame letting such an incident happening in his hospital. He further assured that there is no connection between his medical staff and the suspected person in the article to earn money from patients’ families via selling donated blood.

HCMC People’s Committee approves school aid plan from academic year 2022-2023

The People’s Committee of HCMC has approved the plan on building types of financial assistance that are expected to be applied for public kindergarten and high school levels from the academic year 2022-2023 in the city.

Under the document sent to the Department of Training and Education, the Department of Justice and the Department of Labor, Invalids, and Social Affairs, the People’s Committee of the city has asked for coordination between the departments in setting appropriate institutional financial aid rates for schools at levels, excluding primary school in accordance with the Decree 81/2021/ND-CP dated on August 27, 2021 of the Government on the policy of exemption and reduction of university tuition fees, support for study expenses.

Additionally, the Departments of Training and Education must make a draft plan for school aid and provide advice for the municipal People’s Committee to submit the project to the People’s Council of the city for approval before June 15.

The HCMC Department of Education and Training previously proposed a plan on new tuition fees and exemption of school fees to support students of public and private schools from the academic year 2022-2023 in order to reduce the burden on parents.

Vietnam monitors spread of African swine fever and bird flu

The Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development was asked to closely monitor African swine fever and bird flu, and ensure early detection for preventing the two epidemics from spreading on a large scale.

Deputy Prime Minister Le Van Thanh has just requested the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development to coordinate with relevant localities and agencies in focusing on monitoring pig herds and applying bio-security measures in livestock production.

Moreover, the sector must pay attention to cleaning and disinfecting animal farms and cages with lime powder and chemicals in addition to the construction of disease-free breeding facilities and areas.

In addition, the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development was urged to complete the draft Decree amending and supplementing a number of articles of the Government's Decree No. 02/2017/ND-CP on mechanisms and policies to support agricultural production to restore production in areas damaged by natural disasters and epidemics, and submit it to the Prime Minister for consideration.

Deputy Prime Minister Le Van Thanh has also requested the Ministry of Health to formulate a plan for disease prevention to limit the risk of avian influenza transmission to humans and prevent outbreaks in the community.

Additionally, the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development should coordinate with the Ministry of Health, relevant ministries, and localities to closely monitor the situation of avian influenza to prevent avian influenza from entering and spreading in Vietnam.

Vietnam International Defence Expo 2022 to take place in December

Vietnam International Defence Expo 2022 is scheduled to take place in Hanoi in December.

The announcement was made at a meeting of the event's organising board under the chair of Lieutenant General Phung Si Tan, Deputy Chief of the General Staff of the Vietnam People’s Army.

The expo, which is hosted by Vietnamese Defence Ministry, will showcase means of warfare, state-of-the-art technologies and equipment serving the different military forces.

It is expected to be the place for leading suppliers of defence equipment and services in the world to meet, exchange and evaluate products, technologies and introduce new defence and security solutions for Vietnam and regional countries as well.

Vietnamese professor receives UK Royal Society of Chemistry’s noble prize

Vietnamese Professor Nguyen Thi Kim Thanh has been honoured with the Interdisciplinary Prize of the United Kingdom’s Royal Society of Chemistry for her outstanding achievements in research and innovation.

Thanh, currently working at the University College London (UCL), won the prize for her important contributions to research related to Plasmonic nanoparticles and their magnetism for biomedical applications.

Speaking at the awarding ceremony, she expressed her honour to have interdisciplinary research works with her collaborators recognised, saying that she is happy when her research can bring direct benefits in prolonging the life of cancer patients.

The Interdisciplinary Prizes are awarded for work at the interface between chemistry and other disciplines. The spirit of the prize is to recognise research involving both the broad and evolving subject of chemistry and another discipline.

Philippine beauty queen to judge Miss Universe Vietnam 2022 final

Catriona Gray, the winner of Miss Universe 2018, will serve as one of the judges for the final night of the Miss Universe Vietnam 2022 pageant, which is scheduled to take place in Ho Chi Minh City on June 25.

According to the organising board of the beauty pageant, the Philippine beauty queen has been named among the judging panel alongside other Vietnamese celebrities. This includes supermodels Vu Thu Phuong, Ha Anh, and Vo Hoang Yen, first runner-up of Miss Vietnam 2010, Vu Hoang My, Top 5 at Miss Universe 2018 H’Hen Nie, Miss Universe 2005
winner Natalie Glebova, Vo Thi Xuan Trang, principal of John Robert Powers School, and anthropologist Le Diep Linh.

Catriona Gray is renowned for her incredible beauty, intelligence, and talent and was once voted as Timeless Beauty 2016 by Missosology.

The final night of Miss Universe Vietnam 2022 will also feature several unique performances by Vietnamese singers Dong Nhi, Ho Ngoc Ha, and Lan Nha, as well as the band Da LAB.

Kien Giang Province’s sea, river erosion prevention plans

The Cửu Long (Mekong) Delta province of Kiên Giang plans to build 200 erosion prevention works along its coasts and rivers by 2030.

They are expected to cost more than VNĐ17.4 trillion (US$750 million), which will be provided by the central and local governments.

Of them 182 will be to prevent riverine erosion.

The 18 coastal erosion prevention projects will see 71km of dykes built by 2025, by when another 72 projects involving 480km of river embankments will also be completed.

The remaining 110 projects will build more than 568km of river embankments in 2026-30.

Acording to Lê Quốc Anh, deputy chairman of the province People’s Committee, the province has taken various erosion prevention measures in past years, and they also helped protect the environment, mangrove forests and protective forests and create livelihoods for people.

Hanoi to inoculate vulnerable adults with fourth dose of COVID-19 vaccines

Hanoi is considering injecting the second booster dose, or the fourth dose, of COVID-19 vaccines to vulnerable adults or those who jobs put them at high risk for exposure to COVID-19, starting this month.

People eligible to receive the dose include those aged 50 and above, those aged 18 and above who are diagnosed to be moderately or severely immunocompromised, or those with high-risk jobs such as healthcare workers, frontliners and factory workers.

The capital city aims to have more than 95 percent of the eligible adults administered this time.

It does not rule out the possibility of expanding eligibility for the second booster dose if supply is sufficient.

The vaccines to be used will be Pfizer, Moderna and AstraZeneca.

NA Chairman urges Q&A session to keep close to reality

National Assembly Chairman Vuong Dinh Hue urged NA deputies, ministers and heads of sectors to keep close to realities in putting questions and making replies, so that the Q&A session will produce practical and constructive results, making the best use of the time of the NA session.

“People and voters across the country are awaiting straightforward and responsible answers of the ministers,” he said.

Q&A activities began in the afternoon of June 7, and are slated to last two days and a half, starting with issues related to agriculture and rural development. All Q&A sessions will be broadcast live on national TV and radio channels and the NA’s TV.

Four groups of issues will be addressed during the sessions, which are agriculture-rural development, finance, banking, and transport.

At the end of the Q&A sessions, Deputy Prime Minister Pham Binh Minh will, on behalf of the Government, give further explanations on the raised issues and field questions from the deputies.

The NA will vote on a resolution on the outcomes of Q&A activities, serving as the basis for the NA to supervise the implementation of issues.

Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development will be the first to field questions, which are expected to focus on the organisation of production in combination with markets for agricultural products; and coordination in building mechanisms, policies on trade promotion, negotiations on market opening for Vietnamese farm produce.

The deputies will also inquire into measures to control price fluctuations regarding some agriculture and fishery products, animal feed and agricultural materials, the simplification of administrative procedures, the attraction of investment in agriculture, hi-tech application in agriculture, and response to climate change.

Besides, Deputy Prime Minister Le Van Thanh and the ministers of Planning and Investment, Finance, Industry and Trade, Science and Technology, and Natural Resources and Environment will answer questions on issues related to areas under their management./.

Source: VNA/SGT/VNS/VOV/Dtinews/SGGP/VGP/Hanoitimes