Eighty percent of young Vietnamese people spoke out against corruption via a recent survey conducted by Transparency International and Towards Transparency.

Transparency International (TI), a global civil society organisation leading the fight against corruption, was founded in 1993.

Towards Transparency (IT) is a young Vietnamese non-profit consultancy established in 2008 to advance government efforts in promoting transparency and accountability in term of corruption prevention in Vietnam .

The IT, the official TI contact point, conducted a four-month survey among over 1,000 young Vietnamese people aged 15-30 since last August.

It was found that roughly 95 percent of young people thought that honestly was more important than wealth while 35 percent were ready to use small bribes to solve their problems.

The survey has shown that there are large differences between awareness and action among young people with regard to integrity.

“The honesty of young people has been undergoing change,” Doctor Dang Canh Khanh, former director of the Youth Research Institute said, saying that many had to compromise in order to find jobs, among other opportunities.

Corruption has been recognised as negatively impacting socio-economic development and stability in Vietnam.

Statistics taken from the National Population and Housing Census of 2009 showed that 55 percent of the population was under the age of 30, said Towards Transparency Executive Director Nguyen Thi Kieu Vien.

As it had been determined that people in this age group were the most prone to becoming victim of corruption, prevention efforts had been specifically focused on this section of society, she said.

Tran Van Long, a Governmental inspector, said that the Ministry of Education and Training planned to operate a pilot programme in educating students at some schools nationwide on the negative effects of corruption.

The programme is set to be operated under Government Project 37 issued in 2009 by Prime Minister Nguyen Tan Dung./.