Regional committees meet, sign communication deal with VNA

General To Lam at the opening ceremony (Photo: tinmientay.net)

Lam Dong (VNA) – The Steering Committees for the Northwestern Region, Central Highlands Region, and Southwestern Region met in the Central Highlands province of Lam Dong on September 30 to review their three-month performance and seek stronger roles in regional development. 

Nguyen Van Binh, Chairman of the Party Central Committee’s Economic Commission and head of the Steering Committee for the Northwestern Region, said the Steering Committees were formed in 2002-2004 when the domestic security faced a number of difficulties. So far, the committees’ tasks have been expanded beyond security and defence to socio-economic development affairs. 

Meanwhile, General To Lam, Minister of Public Security and head of the Steering Committee for the Central Highlands Region, said that during the past years, the committees have worked closely together in organising trade, investment and tourism promotion events along with social welfares programmes, attracting resources for the growth of the region. 

The committees have also kept a close watch on disaster prevention and control, drought combat, climate change impacts, forest management and environmental protection, as well as infrastructure development and production in the regions. 

However, along with achievements, the three regions have still faced a number of obstacles, including poor economic competitiveness and incomprehensive socio-economic infrastructure systems, together with difficulties in building trademarks for their agricultural products and tackling sabotage schemes of hostile forces, General To Lam stated. 

At the conference, the three Steering Committees signed a communications coordination agreement with the State-run Vietnam News Agency (VNA), with a view of strengthening communicating and popularising policies and laws of the Party and State to locals in the major regions. 

The move is expected to contribute to boosting socio-economic growth, ensuring security and order in the regions, and safeguarding the country’s sovereignty in land border as well as seas and islands. 

The three major regions, comprising 32 provinces and cities, have high potential for development as well as strategic location in security, defence and economy, but they are still the poorest areas of the country, said General To Lam. 

He stressed the significance of promoting the image of each region and encouraging locals in tapping full potential and advantages of each locality. 

He thanked press agencies, especially the VNA, the official news agency of the Vietnamese Government with a diversity of products and a wide coverage, for spreading updated information to all corners of the nation and the world. 

General To Lam expressed his belief that the deal will help the locals keep up with the socio-economic growths of the three strategic regions, while introducing the regions’ stability and development to people in the rest of the country. 

Meanwhile, VNA General Director Nguyen Duc Loi noted that in the recent three years, the agency has worked hard to bring policies and laws of the Party and State closer to locals in the three regions. 

The VNA has been reporting the socio-economic situation and cultural life of the regional people in an honest, objective, and timely manner, highlighting the regions’ advantages and disadvantages during the implementation of the policies, he said. 

All directions of the Steering Committees for the regions have also been informed to the public, contributing to the maintenance of security and defence as well as the implementation of ethnic and religious affairs of the regions, and the building of the local political system at all levels, said the VNA leader.-VNA