More than 1,000 Asian medical specialists listen to 500 reports

HA NOI — Nearly 1,500 leading medical specialists from 36 countries and territories gathered in Ha Noi yesterday for the 10th Meeting of Endoscopic and Laparoscopic Surgeons of Asia (ELSA 2010).

Opening the meeting, Deputy Minister of Health Nguyen Thi Xuyen stressed the importance and development of endola-paroscopic surgery in the medical sector since the technology was first applied in the 1980s, and the achievements made by Vietnamese surgeons and scientists.

The meeting was an opportunity for Vietnamese specialists to meet with colleagues from regional countries and across the world, helping the Vietnamese medical sector integrate internationally, the deputy minister said.

The three-day meeting heard almost 500 reports on advanced endolaparoscopy, presenting the latest and most important achievements at global and regional healthcare centres. Vietnamese specialists also presented new achievements in endolaparoscopy in the country.

In addition, the delegates participated in an interactive television programme on endolaparoscopic surgery from the Viet Nam-Germany Hospital and the Central Paediatrics Hospital, and attended the launching ceremony of the Exhibition Centre for Medical Instruments and Pharmaceuticals.

Later that day, delegates were received by President Nguyen Minh Triet, who affirmed the Party and State's interest in the medical sector and its commitment to ongoing investment in it.

Although poor and war-devastated, Viet Nam has almost completed the UN Millennium Development Goals ahead of schedule, with outstanding achievements in healthcare and poverty reduction.

President Triet welcomed international delegates to ELSA 2010, saying they brought to Vietnamese people friendly sentiments from international friends and shared experiences on the world's most advanced medicine with Vietnamese colleagues.

He said he hoped other countries would help Viet Nam to train doctors, recommend well-known professors and scientists to work and lecture in Viet Nam and invest in healthcare, in order to help Viet Nam build modern centres.

International delegates spoke highly of recent developments in Viet Nam's medical sector, including endolaparoscopic surgery and Vietnamese doctors' skills, that have helped reduce the number of Vietnamese people seeking treatment abroad.—VNS

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ASEAN-OECD forum discusses administrative reform

Leaders of agencies and departments from member countries of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) and the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) gathered at a seminar to discuss issues regarding administrative reform for socio-economic development in Hanoi on Nov. 25.

The event, the first of its kind in the region, was jointly held by the Vietnamese Government Office, the Interior Ministry and the Foreign Ministry in coordination with the OECD.

According to Nguyen Xuan Phuc, Chairman of the Government Office, the administrative reform, which is seen as a hot issue in the current global context, is playing an increasing important role to help countries surpass the global economic crisis and turn challenges into new opportunities.

Measures used in the administrative reform such as easing the administrative burden and increasing transparency for the regulation system would directly benefit people and businesses without harming the state budget, the minister said.

Meanwhile, Mario Amano, OECD’s deputy secretary general, quoted the organisation’s experiences to underline the necessity to simplify administrative procedures in line with enhancing the flexibility for regulations.

Targeted objects and impacts may affect them should be put as top concerns while adopting regulations, he noted.

Mario Amano said OECD member countries are adjusting regulations that are not suitable with businesses in order to boost economic growth and that the organisation set up a committee on this issue last year.

OECD also has checked out administrative regulations at almost member countries, including China , Brazil , South Africa and India , he said, stressing that the administrative reform can help ASEAN set up production centres and a joint market by 2015 at the regional level.

At the seminar, the participants shared views on institution reform and compared notes on initiatives to get more effective approach in the sector.

The event serves as the first step for long-term cooperation among ASEAN member countries and OECD in the sector, Minister Phuc stated./.

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Proper land management needs greater efforts

Vietnam needs to speed up administrative reforms, improve transparency and access to information as well as mechanisms of accountability so as to prevent corruption in land administration and use.

This is a common recommendation put forward by international delegates at the 8 th Dialogue on Anti-Corruption with the theme, “Anti-corruption in land administration and use” held in Hanoi on November 25.

The Dialogue on Anti-Corruption is organized twice a year by the Embassy of Sweden on behalf of Vietnam ’s development partners, the Government Inspectorate and the Office of the Central Steering Committee for Anti-Corruption on behalf of the Vietnamese Government.

The 8 th dialogue saw the attendance of representatives from Vietnam ’s development partners and donors such as the UN, the World Bank (WB), the Asian Development Bank (ADB), the UK Department for International Development (DFID), the US Agency for International Development (USAID) and the Embassies of Sweden, Switzerland , Denmark , New Zealand and Australia .

Sharing the expressed view, Swedish Ambassador to Vietnam Staffan Herrstrom said: “We know that transparency is a fundamental and effective tool and we know that if you combine that with giving people possibilities to claim accountability very much is achieved already”.

He cited the results of a survey conducted recently by development partners, saying that more than 86 percent of the surveyed households said there is corruption in land administration and use and 33 percent of the targeted businesses said they had to give bribes in order to get certificates of land use.

According to the ambassador, law enforcement and oversight systems are still weak in Vietnam , while procedures of land use right registration are cumbersome, over-bureaucratized and only one percent of people lodging complaints are satisfied in the end. This creates an environment in which corruption can flourish, undermines the credibility of officials and decreases trust among the public at large.

Meanwhile, a representative of the Swiss Embassy emphasized the importance of the promulgation of a law on the protection of whistleblowers and enhancement of the role of mass media in discovering and reporting negative phenomena in land management and use, especially small cases in localities.

A number of delegates recommended Vietnam strengthen the oversight by people and the community over investment projects, improve the capacity of land management agencies, enhance land zoning procedures and seriously enumerate assets and incomes of officials and State employees working in this field.

On the side of the Vietnamese Government, Deputy Minister of Natural Resources and Environment Chu Pham Ngoc Hien said the government had spared no efforts to build and complete a legal system and had instructed relevant ministries and agencies to join in the fight against corruption in land administration and use.

The ministry was drafting a law amending the 2003 Land Law and expected to submit it to the National Assembly for approval in 2013, he said. According to the draft of the revised law, land will be managed in line with market mechanisms, administrative procedures will be simplified and benefits of the State, people, businesses and organizations will be harmoniously addressed.

Statistics released by the Government Inspectorate show that in recent years there have been more than 100,000 land-related disputes annually, accounting for 65 percent of the total number of complaints and denouncements lodged with and reported to State agencies./.

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National study reveals common domestic abuse

The results of the first national study into domestic violence against women in Vietnam were jointly announced by the General Statistics Office (GSO) and the United Nations in Hanoi on Nov. 25.

The study says the majority of Vietnamese married women face the risk of domestic violence, despite the Law on Gender Equality and the Law on the Prevention and Control of Domestic Violence which were passed in 2006 and 2007, respectively.

Fifty-eight percent of Vietnamese married women report experiencing at least one type of domestic violence (physical, sexual or emotional) in their lifetime and only 1.7-6.3 percent of them asked for help at different agencies and organizations.

The study also revealed that 26 percent of women who were physically or sexually abused by their husbands reported suffering physical injuries and 17 percent of them reported being injured multiple times.

Addressing the launching ceremony, GSO Deputy General Director Tran Thi Hang said that for the first time a study seeks to obtain detailed information nationwide about the prevalence, frequency and type of violence against women, looking at the health outcomes of domestic violence, the factors that may protect or put women at risk of domestic violence and coping strategies and services that women can use to deal with domestic violence.

This information will help the Government and relevant agencies work out effective solutions to better implement the two above-mentioned laws, said Hang.

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VN attends South-South development expo

A Vietnamese delegation led by Deputy Minister of Labour, War Invalids and Social Affairs Nguyen Trong Dam attended the South-South Development Exposition at the International Labour Organisation (ILO) headquarters in Geneva, Switzerland from Nov. 22-26.

Attracting over 60 delegations from the ILO member countries, the event would be a venue for developing countries and their partners including donor agencies and international organisations to showcase achievements in their South-South development cooperation.

Seminars on social welfare, sustainable employment, food security, climate change, environment, HIV/AIDS, global health and education were also held.

At a seminar on social welfare and sustainable employment, the delegates called for more proper social policies to tackle major challenges in alarming rate of unemployment, child labour, gender inequality, unsafe working conditions and unstable income.

Speaking at the seminar, Nguyen Thi Lan Huong, head of the Institute of Labour, Science and Social Affairs presented initiatives towards the implementation of Social Welfare Strategy in 2011-2020 in Vietnam.

The initiatives prioritises the poor, people living in disadvantaged areas, ethnic minorities, the unemployed, the disabled, the children, the elderly and disaster victims, helping them live above the poverty line, enjoy benefits of social welfare policies and socio-political stability./.

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Resort flak ‘a warning'

The National Geographic Traveller magazine ratings that list Nha Trang beach as a destination "facing trouble" have come as a warning to the local administration on the need for sustainable tourism development and management.

The comment was made by vice chairman of the central coastal province of Khanh Hoa 's People's Committee Le Xuan Than at a press briefing on Nov. 23.

The list appears in the November/December 2010 issue owned by the National Geographic Society's Centre for Sustainable Destinations.

Than said the province would pay more attention to sustainable tourism, but also added that they have taken many actions to protect and improve Nha Trang beach.

"The province has been investing thousands of billions of Vietnamese dong in upgrading shortcomings in the environment and landscape," he said.

Than said that because Nha Trang beach is located near a populous city with heavy tourism, it was difficult for it to receive high rankings based on National Geographic Traveller magazine's criteria, which stresses beaches' natural and untapped characteristics.

He said that although the committee respected the ratings, newspapers and magazines should provide enough information when quoting from the magazine to avoid misunderstandings and negative effects on the tourism sector of Khanh Hoa.

He particularly noted that Nha Trang beach was listed among the top five beach destinations that "face trouble", not among the "ten worst beach destinations" as was mentioned by some newspapers and magazines.

"The committee will send documents to the magazine to help them have more information and pictures about Nha Trang beach," he said.

Based on six standards, including environmental and ecological quality, social and cultural integrity, the condition of historic buildings and archaeological sites, aesthetic appeal, quality of tourism management, and outlook for the future, Nha Trang received 43 points and was listed as a beach that needs improvement.

To create the ratings, the centre gathered an independent panel of 340 experts in fields from historic preservation and sustainable tourism to travel writing and archaeology to score 99 coastal hot spots around the world, using categories such as "top rated," "doing well," "in the balance," "facing trouble," and "bottom rated"./.

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Smugglers find cigarettes too profitable to give up

Though there has been a sharp decline in the flow of contraband goods from Cambodia into the Mekong Delta, cigarette smuggling remains rampant.

Customs officials in An Giang and Long An provinces said smuggling of beer, wine, sugar, petrol and electronic products was sharply down because the disparity in prices is small but cigarette smuggling has worsened.

Dong Thap province on the border is considered the smuggling hub in the delta. Recently customs officials there discovered 12 cases of smuggled goods worth 234 million VND (11,700 USD), made up mostly of about 5,000 packs of cigarettes.

Deputy head of the Customs Department Le Van Chien said smuggling was hard to prevent because cigarettes were easily divided into small portions for many people to carry over the border.

Kien Giang, the province that has been the most successful in fighting smuggling in the region, reported that this year customs officers discovered 38 cases, mostly cigarettes.

Every year hundreds of thousands of packs were destroyed, it said.

The smuggling goes on with impunity because the penalties are not deterrent enough, with only small fines slapped on anyone caught smuggling.

Tran Minh Tien, deputy head of the Kien Giang Customs Department, said smugglers' tricks were becoming more and more sophisticated.

Tien said smuggled cigarette accounted for 80 percent of supply in the Mekong Delta and HCM City .

According to the Vietnam Tobacco Association, smuggled cigarettes accounts for 20 percent of the amount consumed in Vietnam . In some places it is much higher—70 percent in Can Tho, 46 percent in HCM City , and 41 percent in the southern provinces.

Cigarettes have been smuggled into the country since the 1980s, with volumes reaching 300 – 400 million packs a year initially.

But the situation has worsened since. By 2007 it had risen to 630 million, and to 800 million last year.

Officials seized and destroyed 7.3 million packs last year, or less than 1 percent of the amount smuggled into the country, according to the association.

It is estimated that the country loses at least 3 trillion VND (150 million USD) in taxes while the foreign currency drain is 200 million USD.

Recently the Government said it would take criminal action against anyone caught smuggling more than 1,500 packs.

Those caught with less than 1,500 packs will be fined 100 million VND (5,100 USD)./.

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