National-scale movement needed to encourage learning in society: official

Over the past years, the Party and State have taken numerous measures for improving people’s intelligence, specialised capacity, and comprehensive skills. (Illustrative photo: VNA)

Hanoi (VNA) – As theFourth Industrial Revolution (Industry 4.0) is strongly affecting allsocio-economic aspects, requiring each people to improve their all-round capacity,it is necessary to launch a national-scale emulation movement on promoting educationand building a learning society, an official has said.

Prof. and Dr. Nguyen ThiDoan, former Vice President of Vietnam and Chairwoman of the VietnamAssociation for Promoting Education (VAPE), has pointed out that the country is stillfacing many difficulties in meeting requirements of Industry 4.0 as naturalresources are becoming exhausted, the population aging fast, and foreign officialdevelopment assistance declining.

The most valuable asset nowis human, she noted, adding that over the past years, the Party and State havetaken numerous measures for improving people’s intelligence, specialised capacity,and comprehensive skills.

As of 2020, the HumanDevelopment Index of Vietnam grew by over 48 percent to rank 117 of the 189 listedcountries. With the workforce accounting for 58 percent of the population, theHuman Capital Index of Vietnam was among the highest in the East Asia - Pacificregion.

However, the quality of humanresources is still low compared to that in other countries while in Southeast Asia, Vietnam’s labour productivity is only higher than Cambodia’s andequivalent to just 7.6 percent of Singapore’s.

Prof. and Dr. Nguyen Thi Doan, former Vice President of Vietnam and Chairwoman of the Vietnam Association for Promoting Education (Photo: VNA)

Doan said the development ofa country must be based on knowledge, which can only be acquired throughlearning – learning at school and self-learning.

For the past more than 20years, VAPE has been working hard to boost education and talent promotion aswell as the building of a learning society, but these activities have yet tobecome a nationwide movement. Besides, the implementation of a project onbuilding a learning society under the Prime Minister’s decisions still fell shortof expectations, according to the VAPE leader.

Vietnam is lacking a spiritualcatalyst for learning in the entire population, she said, taking the “Wholecountry join efforts to build new-style countryside” as an example which hasgathered common efforts by all people and gradually given a facelift to ruralareas.

She held that to have aself-learning movement, authorities from the Government to provincial-level People’sCommittees need to take consistent actions in order to obtain the best possibleresults./.

VNA