ASEAN be more united: Vietnamese diplomat

09:09' 31/07/2007 (GMT+7)

VietNamNet Bridge – A Vietnamese senior official urged the ASEAN to bolster solidarity and unity while raising its cooperation efficiency in order to achieve regional integrity and a regional community. Addressing the 40th ASEAN Ministerial Meeting (AMM-40), Deputy Foreign Minister Le Cong Phung stressed that ASEAN needs to be more active and dynamic in its relations with other counterparts while improving cooperation with dialogue partners. The group needs to uphold its leading role in the regional cooperation process to which it was the initiator, including ASEAN+3, East Asia Summit (EAS), and ASEAN Regional Forum (ARF), and should work as a driving force behind other regional integration process in the Asia-Pacific region, he said. In his speech, Deputy FM Phung emphasised the extreme importance of narrowing the development gap in the course of establishing the ASEAN Community. He highlighted the results of the second IAI Development and Cooperation Forum in Hanoi and said these outcomes have contributed to building a new strategy to address the development disparity and better the implementation of the Initiative on ASEAN Integration (IAI) in the future. Deputy FM Phung called on all ASEAN member countries, dialogue partners, regional and international organisations and private sectors to take active part in the group's endeavours to narrow the development gap within the bloc. (Source: VNA, VIet Nam Net)

Vietnam tops Asian hairdressing contest

16:33' 31/07/2007 (GMT+7)

Bui Duc Thinh’s moment of victory VietNamNet Bridge – Defeating seven other contestants, Vietnamese hair designer Bui Duc Thinh won the highest prize at the 2007 Asian Hairdressing-Davines contest held on July 29 at the HCM City Opera House. Bui Duc Thinh recorded the highest score, 36.83. Finishing second was Vietnamese Japanese candidate Dung My Tran with a total score of 34.85. These two winners will represent Asia at the upcoming final of World Style Contest 2007 to be held this October in Barcelona, Spain. Bui Duc Thinh is 21 years of age and comes from the northern city of Hai Phong. “I think my understanding of the current worldwide trends in everyday-style hair designs helped me to acquit myself well,” said the winner. (Source: Tuoi Tre, Viet Nam Net)

The $500mil hotel to change hands?

17:05' 31/07/2007 (GMT+7)

VietNamNet Bridge – The Kanagawa-Vietnam Economic Exchange Association has sent a letter to the Hanoi People’s Committee, announcing its intention of setting up a company in Singapore in charge of running the project on the five-star hotel on the X2 position on Pham Hung road, which Riviera and CSK Finance got the investment rights for in March 2007. A design by Riviera (File photo) When asked to comment about the decision, the Hanoi Planning and Investment Department said that the establishment of a company in Singapore, named SPC, would change the investment legal entity, the investment country and other factors which were accepted by Hanoi authorities in Decision No 1051 dated March 20, 2007. The change of the investor (Singaporean instead of Japanese) does not come in line with the Hanoi authority’s policy regarding the Japanese investor, and thus may raise a complicated lawsuit. According to the department, the construction of a five-star hotel on X2 position (Pham Hung Road, near the national convention centre – a very advantageous position) is an important work to commemorate the 1,000th anniversary of Thang Long-Hanoi. Hanoi authorities chose Riviera and CSK Finance as the project investors out of a lot of other candidates based on the strategic relationship between Vietnam and Japan and the commitments the investors made to the city authorities. Any changes to the project must be approved by the Hanoi People’s Committee in writing. However, the Hanoi People’s Committee, in Document No 3670 dated July 9, 2007, stated that the letter sent by the Kanagawa association was not legal enough to be considered for approval. The letter on the change of investor was signed by Kouhei Suzuki on behalf of the Kanagawa- Vietnam association. Meanwhile, in a communiqué dated December 12, 2006, Riviera and CSK Finance, the official investors of the five-star hotel project, only authorised the association to deal with the Hanoi People’s Committee and relevant agencies to promote investment procedures. The document did not state that the association could act on behalf of them in issues relating to the content of the project. While waiting for the Hanoi People’s Committee to make a final decision, in order to ensure the planned construction pace (construction begins in September 2007 is to be completed in the second quarter of 2010 at the latest), Riviera and CSK Finance still have to fulfill their commitments from before. According to the Hanoi Planning and Investment Department, the project implementation of Riviera and CSK Finance has been going slowly since they got the right to run this project. The investors asked for a delay in presenting the document of guaranteeing the project’s implementation, which should be seen as a break of commitment. Under the city’s regulations, investors must complete the procedures for getting the investment certificate in the second quarter of 2007. However, the work has not been done yet. The investors have asked for a delay in submitting necessary documents for getting the investment certificate to August 3, 2007 instead of July 30, and the ground breaking ceremony will also be delayed to September 20, 2007. If Riviera and CSK Finance still delay the showing of the guarantee for the project’s implementation, it is likely that the city authorities will consider revoking the decision on choosing the two groups as the investors. If so, there will be two scenarios. First, Hanoi will ask the Japanese Embassy to introduce another Japanese investor who can run the project with the same conditions stipulated for the two previously chosen investors. Second, Hanoi will organise public bidding to select investors for the project. To date, the only sum of money Riviera and CSK Finance have paid to Hanoi authorities since they were chosen as the project investors was $3mil in non-refundable aid for the city. Meanwhile, the investors will have to pay the remaining 2.5mil ($5.5mil of non-refundable aid in total) right after they get the investment certificate for the hotel project on the X2 position. As committed, the investors also have the responsibility of paying the sum of $50mil to the Hanoi Treasury as a guarantee for implementing the project (10% of the suggested total investment capital of the project). Moreover, within 30 days after the investors sign the contract on leasing land, investors have to pay the whole sum of money for leasing land for 50 years (the unit price is VND140,000/sq m/year). The hotel projected to be built on X2 position on Pham Hung Road has the total space area of 4ha, and investment capital of $500mil, 18 storeys and 550 5-star hotel rooms. The transfer of investment projects is not prohibited under current law; it is stipulated in provisions 65 and 66 of Decree 108 dated in 2006, guiding the implementation of the 2005 Investment Law. However, the Government has not promulgated detailed regulations on the conditions and procedures for projects using land. Viet Nam Net

Tourism development: conflict of interest

15:37' 31/07/2007 (GMT+7)

Hoi An ancient town attracts many Japanese visitors but only 8% of the tour guides in the town can speak Japanese. VietNamNet Bridge – Vice head of the Vietnam National Administration of Tourism (VNAT) Pham Tu has told the press that the tourism sector may have to ‘flexibly dodge the law’ to develop and in the long term, the sector possibly has to petition law makers to amend the laws. 16 Korean illegal tour guides expelled Local travel firms may lose Asian markets The tourism sector is facing a very problematic situation – seriously lacking tour guides. In the past, travel firms could ‘make full use’ of different sources of human resources to employ as tour guides but now, they are facing big barriers, which are legal regulations. Pham Tu admitted that there was a fierce contradiction between the development of tourism and administrative rules. Vietnam currently has around 5,750 tour guides, a very modest number. It is more problematic when the number of Japanese tourists coming to Vietnam ranks third of all with more than 50,000 people a year but only 8% of tour guides can speak Japanese. As a result, travel firms have to hire illegal foreign tour guides. The chief tourism inspector also said that tourism inspectors had found 40 illegal foreign tour guides in Hanoi within one month of inspection there and 20 of them had been expelled. According to Pham Tu, Vietnam’s tourism sector is being hindered by many barriers of human resources, infrastructure, administrative mechanism and even serious conflicts of many interests. In terms of human resources, Vietnam has ten schools for tourism, which can’t meet the real need of the tourism market in terms of either quantity or quality. While the Vietnam National Administration of Tourism (VNAT) said that travel companies don’t invest in training, travel firms say that if the VNAT can’t do that job how can they? Urgent measures to draw foreign visitors: opening international airports in Hai Phong, Nha Trang and Da Lat; allowing right-handed steering wheel cars from Southeast Asian countries to come to Vietnam; exempting visas for visitors from key tourism markets of Vietnam like European Union member countries, Russia, and Australia; and not organising large-scale and costly festivals; allowing travel firms to employ foreign tour guides. Regarding tourism infrastructure, the system of hotels in Vietnam is small and scattered. The country doesn’t have any hotel which has 1,000 rooms. However, even when investors want to build a big hotel, they can’t find a plot of land that is large enough. The central province of Khanh Hoa currently has 8,000 luxurious rooms but its airport and railway stations are too small. Especially, while the development of tourism requires visa exemptions and environmental protection, Vietnam still maintains the visa mechanism with many tourism markets. The VNAT has many times petitioned to strike this mechanism but it still exists. This is why foreign travelers hesitate to come and return to Vietnam. (Source: Lao dong, Viet Nam Net)