Press Statement of 20th Anniversary of the Establishment of the Vietnam-Singapore Training Centre and 20,000th Vietnamese Participant in the Singapore Cooperation Programme on 16 November 2021

PRESS STATEMENT

20^th Anniversary of the Establishment of the Vietnam-Singapore Training Centre

and 20,000^th Vietnamese Participant in the Singapore Cooperation Programme on 16 November 2021

Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs for the Socialist Republic of Vietnam, Nguyen Quoc Dung, was the Guest-of-Honour at a reception celebrating the 20^th Anniversary of the Signing of the Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) on the Establishment of the Vietnam-Singapore Training Centre and the 20,000^th Vietnamese Participant in the Singapore Cooperation Programme (SCP) held at the Vietnam-Singapore Cooperation Centre (VSCC) on 16 November 2021.

In his remarks, Singapore Ambassador to Vietnam, Jaya Ratnam lauded the dual milestone celebration as a clear testament to strong and enduring partnership between Singapore and Vietnam.   Ambassador highlighted that the recurring theme in Singapore’s and Vietnam’s excellent bilateral ties has been our longstanding partnership in human resource development and that Deputy Foreign Minister Dung’s presence at the event strongly reflects our common belief that human resource development is the key to a country's sustainable development and progress.

Ambassador reiterated Singapore continued strong commitment to support Vietnam’s development journey and noted that we have invested in new capacity building programmes such as on entrepreneurship, digital transformation and cybersecurity to be better aligned with Vietnam’s needs, priorities and aspirations.  Ambassador also noted that the VSCC has been upgraded with video-conferencing equipment to facilitate online courses during the COVID-19 pandemic.  As a result, notwithstanding the disruptions caused by the pandemic, the enrolment numbers for our courses remain high, and the online platforms have allowed us to engage more officials from a wider-range of cities and provinces.  Since FY2020, we have managed to conduct 16 online courses for more than 260 Vietnamese participants on a range of programmes and we are on track to conduct 20 online courses and train more than 400 participants in FY2021.  Ambassador Jaya Ratnam’s full remarks are attached.

In his remarks, Deputy Foreign Minister Nguyen Quoc Dung cited the VSCC as “a perfect example of Vietnam-Singapore cooperative relations” that has made important and practical contributions to help Vietnam’s public administrative system in its regional and international integration process over the past decades.  Deputy Foreign Minister Dung also thanked the Singapore Government and the Embassy for the generous support in re-branding and enhancement of the VSCC in 2018.  He looked forward to more capacity-building support from Singapore as Vietnam seeks to meet its changing needs and adapt to regional and global complexities in the second decade of the 21^st century, with a special focus on building up Vietnam’s development needs as countries recover from the impact of COVID-19.

At the event, Ambassador presented to Diplomatic Academy of Vietnam Acting President Dr Pham Lan Dung a contribution of a compendium of books and journals from Singapore Universities, the Singapore National Library Board, Yusof-Ishak Institute of Southeast Asian Studies and the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy for the DAV’s newly renovated Library building.

Ambassador Jaya Ratnam also announced that the 20,000^th SCP participant from Vietnam is Ms Vu Minh Hien (Ms Hien is currently the Deputy Director of the Market Intelligence and Development Center at the Vietnam National Institute of Software and Digital Content Industry under the Ministry of Information and Communications.  She had attended a virtual online course on “Project Proposal Writing” from 4 to 15 October 2021, which was conducted by trainers from Republic Polytechnic in Singapore and the ASEAN Secretariat in Jakarta, Indonesia).

.     .     .     .     .

SINGAPORE EMBASSY IN HANOI

18 NOVEMBER 2021

Photo Credit:  Singapore Embassy in Hanoi, Vietnam

Caption: Ambassador Jaya Ratnam with Deputy Foreign Minister of the Socialist Republic of Vietnam Nguyen Quoc Dung (left) and Diplomatic Academy of Vietnam Acting President Dr Pham Lan Dung (centre)

.     .     .     .     .