sipila
Fri, 02 Feb 2001 12:02:53 -0800
VNA Young people in Ha Tay join Tet tree planting festival. Localities throughout the country are participating in a tree planting (Lunar New Year) festival. A tree planting festival was launched in Linh Dam River Service and Residential Area in Hanoi's Thanh Tri district on January 29 (the sixth day of Tet) by the Ministry of Construction and the Corporation for Investment and Development of Housing and Urban Areas. Deputy Prime Minister Nguyen Cong Tan, Minister of Construction Nguyen Manh Kiem and Hanoi's People's Committee Chairman Hoang Van Nghien attended the launching ceremony and, together with 500 cadres and workers, planted the first trees. This is the fourth time the Ministry of Construction and the Corporation for Investment and Development of Houses and Urban Areas have organised tree planting festival in Linh Dam River Area. This is aimed at making a greener, cleaner and more beautiful scenery for the capital's southern gate. To date, there are tens of thousands of trees planted around Linh Dam River area, contributing to increasing the attraction of the new urban area. People of ethnic minority groups of Dien Bien district of Lai Chau northern mountainous province have planted tens of thousands of assorted trees on each tree planting festival. This year, the province is striving to plant 10% more than the number of trees planted last year. This year, the northern province of Nam Dinh hopes to grow 300 hectares of coastal protective forest and five million scattered trees and continues to tend 7,200 hectares of forest land. All eight districts and towns of Ninh Binh northern province have launched tree planting festivals on January 29. According to initial figures, about 9,000 scattered trees were planted on the roadside, in schools and on barren hills on the first day. The northern mountainous province of Lao Cai, this year, aims to grow 3,500 hectares of assorted trees with the aim of bringing the forest coverage to 34% of the whole province area. Ben Tre southern province's agricultural sector has prepared eight million assorted seedlings in a bid to restore the garden economy for farmers. The flood, which hit the province last year, damaged thousands of hectares of orchards. **** Huong Pagoda festival opens The Huong (Perfume) Pagoda festival in Huong Son commune, My Duc district, Ha Tay northern province, was opened on January 29 (the sixth day of Tet). Local leaders, thousands of Buddhist followers and tourists flocked to the festival on the first day. Huong Pagoda festival is a grand one, lasting for three spring months. Each year, the festival attracts between 350,000 and 450,000 visitors. An organising board has been set up to maintain safety, law and order. Huong Son commune has prepared 3,000 ferry boats to carry visitors. >From January 25 (the second day of Tet) to yesterday, about 5,000 to 6,000 domestic and foreign visitors had come to Huong Pagoda each day. **** Tet celebrated in Belgium, Sweden The Vietnamese Embassy in the Kingdom of Sweden held a get-together in Brussels on January 28 to celebrate Tet (Lunar New Year), according to the Vietnam News Agency correspondent. Over one hundred Vietnamese working and studying in Belgium and Belgian friends attended the event. Vietnamese ambassador to Belgium, Ton Nu Thi Ninh, wished the participants a happy new year and expressed her hope that the Vietnamese in Belgium would make more contributions to the national building. Earlier, the Vietnamese Embassy in Sweden organised a meeting on the occasion of the Lunar New Year. Foreign friends expressed their admiration at the important achievements of Vietnam in the last year and wished that the Vietnamese people would gain greater socio-economic achievements in 2001 and the following years. **** Law reform boosts social progress Cutting its poverty rate by more than half during the past 15 years can be attributed to Vietnam's reform of social policy, says Labour, War Invalids and Social Affairs Minister Nguyen Thi Hang. Ms Hang says that in addition to increased spending for social development - 25% of last year's budget - the government has devised policies that encourage individuals to make money in complience with the law, while encouraging all society and the international community to become involved in dealing with social problems. A range of newly-promulgated legal documents and changes to existing laws - the Labour Code, the Child Care and Protection Law, the Education Law and the Decree for the Disable - had adjusted the legal system to the new situation and had served as a lever to social development. Several social-development programmes - poverty alleviation, job generation in communities with special difficulties, the supply of safe water, environmental protection, expanded immunisation for children, illiteracy eradication and combating social vices - have also been implemented. As a result, the national poverty rate was reduced from 30% in 1992 to about 11% last year that means about 300,000 families lifting themselves above the poverty line each year. Reducing unemployment is difficult for the government because the national workforce grew to 40.6 million in 2000 from 30.9 million in 1991, a yearly increase of 2.9%. However, the country managed to generate 1.2 million jobs each year for the last ten years. Population growth dropped by about five per 1,000 every year, helping partially ordinary people to wider social-services access. Major achievements included the universalisation of primary education and providing access to health care services for more than 90% of the population and safe water for 60% of household. The government has emphasised development of agriculture and different crafts, especially export oriented industries and services in rural areas, so as to generate employment for the rural population which has the highest unemployment and underemployment rates. The government has also set out to win overseas labour contracts for 50,000 workers this year. "Labour exportation is very helpful for national human resource development, the transfer of technology and increasing hard currency remittances," says Ms Hang. Long-term, the country is working to achieve universalisation of junior secondary education, increase the average lifespan to 72 and reduce malnourishment among children under five to less than 25% by 2010. The rate is now more than 30%. (VNA) _________________________________________________ KOMINFORM P.O. Box 66 00841 Helsinki Phone +358-40-7177941 Fax +358-9-7591081 http://www.kominf.pp.fi General class struggle news: [EMAIL PROTECTED] subscribe mails to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Geopolitical news: [EMAIL PROTECTED] subscribe: [EMAIL PROTECTED] __________________________________________________