The Ha Nam provincial People’s Committee and US-based ORBIS organisation on April 15 signed a 2.8 billion VND deal to improve eye care for children in the province over the next five years.

The project is designed to prevent and alleviate blindness among the children of Ha Nam . It will set up a network to diagnose and treat eye-related diseases, improve the quality of eye care services at Ha Nam Ophthalmology hospital, and restore the eyesight of children who are at high risk of blindness.

In addition, ORBIS will provide training courses for medical staff at district and communal levels, assist in raising public awareness of eyesight protection for children, provide equipment to the hospital, and build child-friendly eye clinics in Binh Luc and Thanh Liem districts.

In the 2004-2007 period, ORBIS provided training to 16 surgeons, 53 doctors and 1,600 medical workers, and provided free surgery to 1,537 cataract patients.

Also on the same day, the National Fund for Vietnamese Children (NFVC) held an graduation ceremony for its vocational training class for 22 disadvantaged children in Dong Du village, Binh Luc district of Ha Nam province.

The class is the last one within the framework of a project on embroidery skills training for children, which is mainly funded by the France-based “Tam long tre Viet” (Viet bamboo heart) organisation.

From October 2009 to March 2010, the 198 million VND project organised four free embroidery training classes for 88 children from difficult circumstances in four villages of Ha Nam ’s Binh Luc district.

So far, all the young participants have secured stable jobs with incomes ranging from 300,000 VND to 500,000 VND a month. Their products are not only available on the domestic market, but also in foreign countries including the UK and Italy./.