KTFA: Vietnam

Henig:  Moc Chau, a four-season destination

06:00 | 07/01/2023

(VEN) - Moc Chau Plateau, located in the northern mountainous province of Son La, about 180km north west of the capital Hanoi, has long been considered one of Vietnam’s most attractive destinations, especially when the plum trees blossom early in the year.

Moc Chau is cool and beautiful all year round. The pine forests in Ang Village, the Mu Nau plum valley, sunflower gardens, Moc Chau Tea Hill, Chieng Khoa, Fairy and Dai Yem waterfalls, Grassland 68, Bach Long (White Dragon) glass bridge, and Pha Luong Peak should not be missed.

When the spring sun shines on Moc Chau, the typical flowers of the northwest mountains race to show off, painting the landscape with white apricot flowers, plum blossoms, bright pink peach blossoms, brilliant yellow cabbage beds, and young green buds.

Moc Chau has many famous plum growing areas such as Pa Phach Village, and Mu Nau, Thung Cuong and Na Ka valleys. Usually, the plum trees start to bloom in mid-January to the end of February, but in 2022, many blossomed in early November.

Every spot covered by blooming flowers along National Highway 6 from Hanoi to Moc Chau is crowded with tourists. Backpackers who seek pristine beauty visit flower forests in remote villages.

A plum garden owner in Na Ka Valley said that while tourism has developed, the valley retains much of its original wild character. The most suitable time of the day to visit Na Ka is in the morning or early afternoon, from the beginning of winter to the end of May.

If you plan to visit Moc Chau in the autumn, don't miss the opportunity to celebrate Independence Day on September 2 with the Mong people. While the Mong people's traditional Tet (New Year) celebration usually takes place within the family or neighboring villages, the Independence Day festivities Tet is held throughout the area, including Moc Chau Town. Visitors can admire the beauty of traditional costumes, and immerse themselves in the Mong people's unique folk activities.

From May, plums begin to ripen and local growers harvest them and sell to traders in the lowlands. In summer, the highlands are suitable for picnics and walks because of the fresh air and many outdoor activities.

The ripe persimmon season in Moc Chau usually runs from September to December, but it is most beautiful in mid-November and early December when the weather turns cold and the hillsides are dappled with the colorful trees.

In November, the highland is adorned in white by cauliflower, and in December by yellow wild sunflowers.

A new tourist draw is the 632-meter-long Bach Long (White Dragon) glass bridge that was crowned with a Guinness World Record for its length.

The bridge also set a second Guinness world record as it has the world's longest glass-bottom cliff side path measured at 327 meters. Inaugurated on the Reunification Day (April 30) in 2022, the bridge is suspended some 150 meters above a lush green jungle valley. The glass-floored bridge is the latest tourist attraction in Moc Chau. At the foot of the bridge is Muong Mooc Cave, also known as Chim Than Cave, with natural stalactites and stone sculptures that reflect the daily lives of the ancient Thai ethnic minority group.

A one-way bus ticket from Hanoi to Moc Chau costs VND160-250,000. The drive by bus or car takes 3.5-4 hours.  LINK

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Henig:  Starbucks commits to expanding in Việt Nam with 100th-store plan

January, 06/2023

Starbucks is committed to expanding further in Việt Nam with its plan of opening the 100th store by the end of the second quarter this year

HÀ NỘI — Starbucks is committed to expanding further in Việt Nam with its plan of opening the 100th store by the end of the second quarter this year – a decade after the first shop opened in HCM City in February 2013.

Currently, the US coffee chain runs 87 outlets across seven cities and provinces nationwide with 50 in HCM City and 24 in Hà Nội and more than 1,000 employees (including 200 coffee masters).

“So, as you can see, there’s plenty of opportunities to continue growing in the market,” CEO of Starbucks Vietnam, Patricia Marques told reporters in Hà Nội on Friday.

According to the CEO, Starbucks will continue to open more stores, in addition to places that the chain has visited to better serve customers in their neighbourhoods.

Most recently, the US chain opened a new store in Hội An on December 9. It is also targeting new opportunities in Bình Dương and Quy Nhơn provinces for this year’s plan.

A recent report of the fast-moving consumer goods (FMCG) in the Asian region announced by Kantar World Panel showed Việt Nam’s beverage industry has recovered after two years of being affected by the COVID-19 pandemic. The third quarter of 2022 recorded an average growth rate of 5.2 per cent, only 0.4 per cent lower than the average growth rate of the whole of Asia.

“The beverage sector will bounce back from the lockdown in Việt Nam and seems to thrive again after two years of decline,” Kantar report said.

Despite being a giant in the international markets, Starbucks must compete with rising local brands.

Việt Nam’s tea and coffee market is dominated by local franchise brands, including Highlands Coffee (573 stores), The Coffee House (154) and Phúc Long (118), according to Statista data as of December 2022.

According to India-based market research company Mordor Intelligence, increasing busy lifestyle and longer working hours is likely to strengthen the consumption of coffee. Việt Nam’s coffee market is projected to witness a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 8.07 per cent during 2022-27.

To increase its competition in the “world coffee capital”, besides continuing expansion, Starbucks Vietnam CEO said the chain will strive to optimise costs by improving management capacity, human resource capacity and operational efficiency at each store.

In addition, to celebrate its 10-year journey in Việt Nam, customers in Việt Nam will have a chance to enjoy Starbucks Vietnam Đà Lạt coffee in September 2023.

— VNS  LINK

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Henig:  Booming e-commerce sales provides opportunity for cooperatives

January, 06/2023

According to the Ministry of Industry and Trade, made-in-Việt Nam goods accounted for more than 90 per cent of products on shelves of domestic distribution companies and 60-95 per cent of foreign supermarket chains.

HÀ NỘI — Booming e-commerce in Việt Nam is providing significant opportunities to promote sales while cooperatives are trying to improve the quality of their products to meet consumers' demands better.

According to the Ministry of Industry and Trade, made-in-Việt Nam goods accounted for more than 90 per cent of products on shelves of domestic distribution companies and 60-95 per cent of foreign supermarket chains.

According to a survey by e-commerce aggregator platform iPrice Group, the percentage of shopping through online channels more than doubled over the same period last year.

Seeing the trend of booming e-commerce, highlighted after the COVID-19 pandemic, cooperatives were making moves to promote sales via this channel.

Many cooperatives improve their products in terms of quality, packaging, and origin to better meet the demand of consumers, which would help improve consumers' trust in shopping online.

Quyết Thanh Agriculture Cooperative had arranged their dried mango pieces into a brilliant yellow rose and packed it in a round plastic box instead of a zip bag. According to the cooperative, this helped attract the attention of many consumers in both online and offline channels.

Cooperatives also cooperated with e-commerce platforms to improve the production and distribution process.

Nguyễn Thị Hoan, director of Tài Hoan Vermicelli Cooperative in Bắc Kạn Province, said that in the past, customers were concerned about the quality and origin of products which were sold online. Still, many cooperatives opened official kiosks on e-commerce platforms where customers could be assured of the product quality and a clear origin.

Lưu Thị Hoà, director of Po Mỷ Cooperative in Hà Giang Province, said that e-commerce platforms helped cooperatives to reach more customers. Moreover, the consumer information file of e-commerce platforms was diverse, which would help cooperatives to improve their adaptation to the market demand and increase revenue.

According to Nguyễn Thị Mỹ Hạnh, deputy director of Grab Việt Nam, if the cooperatives across the country knew how to take advantage of support tools and features on e-commerce platforms and online sites to reach target customers, cooperatives could grow strongly in revenue and reap many sweet fruits in the year-end shopping season.

The application of digital technology was considered an important factor in creating breakthroughs in developing cooperatives.

Director of Tam Đảo Mushroom Cooperative Nguyễn Quốc Huy said that the cooperative installed an automatic irrigation system, net house, greenhouses, a semi-automatic control system, accounting software, online tax declaration, email, data storage, digital signature and camera system to ensure the quality of products for exports. The cooperative’s products were also sold on e-commerce platforms such as Postmart.vn and Voso.vn.

According to the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development, there are more than 17,770 agricultural cooperatives in Việt Nam; 1,718 of these have applied high technology in farming and preservation, automation technology and biotechnology.

Of them, 21 per cent have plans for e-commerce sales, 23 per cent sell their products on e-commerce platforms, 21 per cent have created simple websites, 7 per cent have websites that appear on Google and 7 per cent advertise on Facebook.

— VNS    LINK

MoIT urges guaranteed fuel supply amid Nghi Son refinery’s troubleshooting

09:58 | 06/01/2023

The Ministry of Industry and Trade (MoIT) has sent an urgent dispatch to the Vietnam Oil and Gas Group along with petrol and oil businesses and traders, requesting them to ensure petrol and oil supply amid an output decline at the Nghi Son oil refinery in early January due to a technical incident.

The Nghi Son refinery, based in central Thanh Hoa province and run by the Nghi Son Refinery and Petrochemical Co. Ltd, is one of the two plants providing 80 percent of petrol and oil for the Vietnamese market. Its residual fluid catalytic cracking (RFCC) unit has been temporarily shut for fixing a leakage problem.

The problem is predicted to lead to a reduction of 20 - 25 percent in the refinery’s planned petrol and oil output on the first 10 days of January, according to the MoIT.

The MoIT asked the Nghi Son company and the Binh Son Refining and Petrochemical JSC, which operates the Dung Quat oil refinery in central Quang Ngai province, to maximise their capacity and use stockpiles or other sources to make up for the reduction.

 The Nghi Son company was also told to quickly fix the problem and stabilise production activities.

 Meanwhile, petrol and oil wholesalers were demanded to seek alternative supply sources and increase import so as to guarantee sufficient supply before, during and after the Lunar New Year (Tet) holiday in late January and through to the end of the first quarter, according to the dispatch.

VNA   LINK

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Henig:  Personal financial planning crucial to economic development

January, 07/2023

GDP growth must be accompanied by personal financial development, economic experts said at a seminar on Thursday.

HÀ NỘI — GDP growth must be accompanied by personal financial development, economic experts said at a seminar on Thursday.

The event, themed “Personal Financial Planning in Việt Nam - Current Situation and Solutions” was held by the Việt Nam Financial Consulting Association (VFCA).

At the seminar, Ngô Thanh Huấn, Director of Personal Finance Division - FIDT Joint Stock Company, a member of the Expert Council - VFCA, said that by 2030-2040, Việt Nam will have about 20 million people reach their retirement age. Meanwhile, Việt Nam is in the group of countries with the highest pension payment rate in the world, with a maximum payout of 75 per cent.

This makes the difference between income and expenditure of the pension fund until 2031 expected to be negative by nearly VNĐ36 trillion (US$1.5 million), according to a report by the State Audit.

According to Huấn, in order to reduce the burden on the pension fund as well as society, the development of the microfinance system and personal finance plays an important role. Because if each individual and household can financially prepare for retirement, they will contribute to reducing the burden on the Government and society.

Phạm Anh Khôi, General Director of Tulip Real Estate Financial Services Joint Stock Company (FINA), said that focusing on GDP development will not make much sense if individuals and households are not financially secure. Because when these individuals reach retirement age, the financial burden will eventually fall on the Government.

Personal financial development plays an important role in reducing the social burden when the population aging process takes place. And the profession of personal financial planning also plays an important role in the development of this field.

Giving opinions at the seminar, economist Vũ Đình Ánh said that personal finance is the final piece of microfinance, one of the goals of developing the National Comprehensive Financial Strategy of the Vietnamese government. However, this is a completely new field and industry in Việt Nam, unlike other industries such as real estate, securities or insurance.

The expert said that in addition to general standards, personal financial planning also needs a set of standards, thereby serving as a measure for activities in the market.

However, Ánh also said that the difficulty of the personal finance sector is that there is currently no State agency to manage this area.

Lê Long Giang, Chairman of VFCA, said that at present, the field of personal financial planning has developed widely in the world, especially with the birth and development of the Financial Planning Standards Board (FPSB) and Financial Planning Standardisation Boards in 27 member countries.

In Việt Nam, the sector of personal financial planning and consulting is just beginning to develop, but is also facing many problems and obstacles.

There has been a series of cases of financial fraud, including the creation of websites, trading platforms and applications to make money, as well as using decoys offering high profits to entice investment in virtual currency, foreign exchange or appropriation of assets in the fields of finance, securities, investment and corporate bond issuance.

Therefore, Giang said it is necessary to set standards for the field of personal financial planning and consulting in Việt Nam, following international standards and practices.

VNS   LINK

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Henig:  Cybersecurity resilience emerges as top priority for Vietnamese organizations

15:39 | 05/01/2023

Cybersecurity resilience is a top priority for companies in Vietnam as they look to defend against a rapidly evolving threat landscape, according to the latest edition of Cisco’s annual study, Security Outcomes Report.

Titled, Security Outcomes Report, Volume 3: Achieving Security Resilience, the study identifies the top seven success factors that boost enterprise security resilience, with a particular focus on cultural, environmental, and solution-based factors that businesses leverage to achieve security. The findings are based on survey responses from over 4,700 participants across 26 countries.

Resilience has emerged as a top priority as a staggering 63 percent of organizations surveyed said they had experienced a security event that impacted business in the past two years. The leading types of incidents were distributed denial of service attacks (71 percent), network or data breach (64 percent), network or system outage (55 percent), and ransomware event (52 percent).

These incidents resulted in severe repercussions for the companies that experienced them, along with the ecosystem of organizations they do business with. The leading impacts cited include IT/communications interruption, supply chain disruption, loss of competitive advantage, and response and recovery costs.

With stakes this high, it is no surprise that 97 percent of executives surveyed for the report said that security resilience is a high priority for them. The findings further highlight that the main objectives of security resilience for security leaders and their teams are to mitigate financial losses from security incidents, ensure business continuity through disruptive events, and prevent major security incidents and losses.

“Technology is transforming businesses at a scale and speed never seen before. While this is creating new opportunities, it also brings with it challenges, especially on the security front. To be able to tackle these effectively, companies need the ability to anticipate, identify, and withstand cyber threats, and if breached be able to rapidly recover from one. That is what building resilience is all about,” said Helen Patton, CISO, Cisco Business Security Group.

“Security, after all, is a risk business. As companies don’t secure everything, everywhere, security resilience allows them to focus their security resources on the pieces of the business that add the most value to an organization, and ensure that value is protected,” she added.

Seven success factors of security resilience

This year’s report has developed a methodology to generate a security resilience score for the organizations surveyed and identify seven data-backed success factors. Globally, organizations that had these factors present were among the top 90th percentile of resilient businesses. Conversely, those lacking these were placed in the bottom 10th percentile of performers.

The findings of the study underline the fact that security is a human endeavor as leadership, company culture and resourcing have a significant impact on resilience:

In addition, businesses need to take care to reduce complexity when transitioning from on-premise to fully cloud-based environments.

Finally, adopting and maturing advanced security solutions has significant impacts on resilient outcomes.

“The Security Outcomes Reports are a study into what works and what doesn’t in cybersecurity. The ultimate goal is to cut through the noise in the market by identifying practices that lead to more secure outcomes for defenders,” said Jeetu Patel, Executive Vice President and General Manager of Security and Collaboration at Cisco. “This year we focus on identifying the key factors that elevate the security resilience of a business to among the very best in the industry.”

Cisco (NASDAQ: CSCO) is the worldwide leader in technology that powers the Internet. Cisco inspires new possibilities by reimagining your applications, securing your enterprise, transforming your infrastructure, and empowering your teams for a global and inclusive future.

PV  LINK