Vietnamese Deputy Prime Minister Nguyen Thien Nhan met with representatives from Japanese universities at a forum in Tokyo on May 25 to discuss measures to boost bilateral education cooperation. Deputy PM Nhan said that the Vietnamese government has decided to introduce Japanese language into secondary schools and wants to cooperate with Japan to improve Vietnamese tertiary education. Vietnam has also introduced a model incorporating Japanese agencies into the country’s education and training institutions and state-owned enterprises and is working with Japan on future projects to expand bilateral cooperation in education, training, science and technology, and the development of human resources. Japan’s Deputy Education, Culture, Tourism, Sports, and Science and Technology Minister Teru Fukui said that his country has actively promoted cooperation with Vietnam through the Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA)’s various projects. As one of the largest providers of official development assistance (ODA) for Vietnam’s education sector, Japan had invested in 1,900 Vietnamese projects, capitalized at nearly $32 billion. Vietnam now has 4,400 students in Japan, ranking third among the countries having the highest number of students in the East Asian nation, only behind China and South Korea. (Cong An Nhan Dan – People’s Police May 28 p6, www.dangcongsan.vn [1] May)
