Day: February 28, 2022

Hanoi disbursed some 2.2 trillion VND (96.44 million USD) worth of investment sourced from the State budget in February, equivalent to 66.5 percent of last month’s figure, but an increase of 6.2 percent year-on-year, the municipal Statistics Office reported.

In the first two months of this year, disbursed investment was over 5.5 trillion VND, up 4.7 percent from the same period last year and completing 10.8 percent of the yearly target.

The city is also working hard to attract capital from other sources to spur its economic development and accelerate infrastructure construction.

It licensed eight new FDI projects this month with total registered capital of 1.2 million USD. Another 10 projects also increased their investment by 2.2 million USD. Meanwhile, foreign investors’ capital contribution and stake purchase were valued at 1.2 million USD.

During the two-month period, Hanoi lured 470.7 million USD worth of FDI, of which new capital was 10.7 million USD, adjusted capital 112.6 million USD, and capital contribution and stake purchase by foreign investors 347.5 million USD.

In February, the city counted 1,487 newly-established firms, a year-on-year rise of 26 percent, with combined capital reaching 30 trillion VND, up 87 percent.

Meanwhile, 309 enterprises dissolved, up 19 percent, and 1,752 others registered for temporary suspension, a 3.3-fold increase, and 1,063 resumed their operations, a 3.2-fold rise.

The number of new enterprises in the city in the first two months was 3,400, up 5 percent from the same period last year. The numbers of businesses dissolved and temporarily suspended went up 4 percent and 98 percent, respectively.

A total of 4,200 businesses restored their operations in the two months, up 31 percent, the office said./.

Source: Vietnam News Agency

The southern province of Kien Giang welcomed over 1 million tourists, including over 18,600 foreigners, in the first two months of 2022, up 27 percent year-on-year.

Of the total, around 741,600 tourists travelled to Phu Quoc island city, representing a year-on-year rise of over 30 percent. The city earned over 750 billion VND (32.8 million USD) from tourism services.

This year, the province is striving to attract 5.6 million holiday-makers, including 200,000 foreigners, and earn around 7.75 trillion VND.

To that end, the province has promoted communications to popularise the image of its tourism with the message of “Kien Giang – a safe destination”. It has encouraged and created favourable conditions for travel businesses to actively participate in tourism promotion programmes, and introduce products and services at tourism fairs, cultural events and traditional festivals held in localities inside and outside the province. It will focus on key markets such as Hanoi, Ho Chi Minh City, the central, Central Highlands and northwest regions.

Bui Quoc Thai, Director of the provincial Department of Tourism, emphasised that the province will strengthen links and cooperation in tourism development with Hanoi, Ho Chi Minh City, the Mekong Delta region and some other key tourism localities in the country, and intensify international cooperation.

Attention will be paid to improving the quality of tourism services, diversifying products and product chains, and combining with domestic tourist routes to make Kien Giang an attractive destination to tourists./.

Source: Vietnam News Agency

The Ministry of Health has announced the extension of an additional three months to the shelf-life of Cuba’s Abdala vaccine against COVID-19.

On October 8, 2021, the Ministry of Health issued Decision No. 4749/QD-BYT on conditional approval of the Abdala vaccine for urgent needs in the prevention and control of the COVID-19 pandemic. According to the producer’s instructions for use, the shelf life is six months at storage conditions of two to eight degrees Celsius.

Like other COVID-19 vaccines, the Abdala vaccine is researched and approved on a rolling basis, meaning it is approved for completed portions while the manufacturer continues doing research on others.

According to the Ministry of Health’s statement on February 28, based on additional studies assessing the stability related to the vaccine’s shelf life, Vietnam’s specialised agencies have considered and appraised it.

Specifically, on February 23, the Drug Administration of Vietnam agreed to increase the shelf life of the Abdala vaccine from six months to nine months at storage conditions of two to eight degrees Celsius.

The Ministry of Health affirmed that increasing the shelf life of the Abdala vaccine would not change the quality, safety and effectiveness of the vaccine./.

Source: Vietnam News Agency

The Mekong Delta province of Tien Giang has made strong investment in expanding its transport system that connects with other regional localities in order to motivate the local economic development.

Tran Van Bon, Director of the provincial Department of Transport said that Tien Giang has mobilised investment from all sources, including foreign investment, in socio-economic infrastructure system.

The department has made recommendations to the provincial People’s Committee on the upgrade of major transport works.

They include the bypass of National Highway 1 through Cai Lay township; the Trung Luong – My Thuan expressway; provincial road 872B (through Go Cong Tay district) from National Highway 50 to Tan Long ferry terminal; expansion of four narrow bridges on National Highway 1 through the province; along with the construction of the new provincial road 878 to the industrial area in the southeast of Tan Phuoc, and a road along Tien river (from Cai Be township to My Thuan bridge), according to the official.

Bon stressed that the transport works of regional connectivity have helped boost the socio-economic development of Tra Vinh and the region as a whole.

Meanwhile, Huynh Thanh Binh, Chairman of the People’s Committee of Go Cong Tay district said that the provincial road 872B is an important work that remove the transport bottleneck for Long Binh industrial cluster in Long Binh township. It has created a important corridor facilitating trade activities and opened up economic development opportunities for the whole region.

Meanwhile, the provincial road connecting the industrial area in the southeast region of Tan Phuoc district with the Ho Chi Minh City-Trung Luong expressway has made transport system of Tan Phuoc 1 and 2 industrial parks smoother.

Last year, Tien Giang put five bridges into operation at total cost of over 638 billion VND (27.96 million USD).

Tran Van Dung, Vice Chairman of the provincial People’s Committee said that in the future, Tien Giang will continue to priotitise the development of the infrastructure system in the core urban areas of three major economic regions of My Tho city, Go Cong township and Cai Lay township.

At the same time, it will upgrade the urban transport system to complete its target of becoming a new-style rural province in 2025./.

Source: Vietnam News Agency

The Ministry of Labour, Invalids and Social Affairs (MOLISA)’s National Coordination Office for Poverty Reduction and the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) on February 28 signed a memorandum of understanding and launched a project on programme development and policy advising on multidimensional and sustainable poverty reduction for 2021-2023.

In his remarks, Deputy Minister of Labour, Invalids and Social Affairs Le Van Thanh stressed the Vietnamese Party, Government and people pay great attention to sustainable poverty reduction, considering it a major task throughout the national reform, construction, and development cause.

Vietnam’s poverty rate, which was 58.1 percent in 1993, decreased to 2.75 percent in 2020 and 2.23 percent in 2021. On January 18 this year, the Prime Minister issued Decision No. 90/QD-TTg approving the national target programme on sustainable poverty reduction in the 2021-2025 period, which focuses on investing in improving the capacity of the poor and clearly identifies the causes of poverty in order to radically and thoroughly solve the problem.

Thanh noted to implement the decision, the ministry wants to boost bilateral and multilateral cooperation with international partners in order to successfully achieve the goal of multidimensional, inclusive, and sustainable poverty reduction.

The launched project is a join work among the UNDP, the MoLISA, and the Australian Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (DFAT). It has provided technical support for the MOLISA in a series of contents, such as researching and developing the national programme; studying and finalising the poverty line and instruments for multi-dimensional poverty measurement for the period 2021 – 2025 which are relevant to Vietnam; and researching and proposing solutions to support the poor affected by the COVID-19 pandemic; among others.

“This project demonstrates the commitment from UNDP to support MOLISA in their vision to deliver the National Targeted Programme on Sustainable Poverty Reduction. Our tried and tested innovative solutions will be applied more widely to help meet the national target programme’s objective of reducing the number of poor and near-poor households by half by 2025,” said UNDP Resident Representative in Vietnam Caitlin Wiesen.

“Australia is committed to supporting sustainable and inclusive growth in Vietnam. The UNDP-MOLISA partnership that is officially launched today is part of Australia’s commitment. We value this partnership as it has led to innovative solutions for poverty reduction to be embedded in government programs and policies,” said Australian Ambassador to Vietnam Robyn Mudie./.

Source: Vietnam News Agency

A total 94,385 cases of COVID-19 were recorded in the past 24 hours from 4pm February 27 to 4pm February 28, according to the Ministry of Health.

Hanoi continued to record the highest number of infections with 12,850, followed by Quang Ninh with 9,105, Nghe An 3,958 and Bac Ninh 3,572.

The national tally now stands at 3,443,485 cases, including 40,252 deaths.

The day also saw 27,039 people given the all-clear, pushing the total recoveries to 2,438,951 to date. There are 3,473 severely ill patients under treatment.

On February 27, 203,673 doses of COVID-19 vaccines were administered, raising the total to 193,625,095./.

Source: Vietnam News Agency

Vietnam welcomed 49,200 foreign tourists in the first two months of 2022, representing a year-on-year surge of 71.7 percent, the General Statistics Office (GSO) reported on February 28.

The majority of international holiday-makers arrived in Vietnam by air, accounting for 87.8 percent of the total foreign arrivals, the office said.

In February alone, the number of foreign visitors to Vietnam increased by 49.6 percent month-on-month, and 196.6 percent compared to the same period last year.

The positive results were attributed to Vietnam’s pilot roadmap for re-opening its door to foreign tourists, and the resumption of international air routes.

The tourism industry is implementing the second phase of a pilot programme on welcoming international visitors, while making necessary preparations to fully open tourism activities from March 15.

This year, the sector is expected to serve 65 million holiday-makers, including 5 million foreigners, and earn 440 trillion VND (19.2 billion USD)./.

Source: Vietnam News Agency