Young pop star Son Tung M-TP has set a new record among Vietnamese artists for having his latest YouTube video hit the one-million-view mark less than 20 minutes after being uploaded on YouTube on Saturday.
The music video, titled Chay ngay di, or “Run now”, was uploaded on the world’s biggest video-sharing site at 12:00 am, and quickly fielded one million views at 12:18 am.
The 4 minute and 33 second video has become the YouTube music video by a Vietnamese artist that reached the one million view mark in the shortest time.
Son Tung M-TP, 24, is well-known among Vietnamese youth for an abundance of hit songs.
More than 10.1 million followers on his verified Facebook account had been notified of the launch of the latest music video beforehand.
At the time of writing, Chay ngay di has racked up more than 12 million views on YouTube, 16 hours since being uploaded.
The success of the music video is comparable to those of K-pop artists from South Korea.
Vietnamese fans are eager to see if the video could smash the record currently held by K-pop boy band BTS, whose music video titled DNA passed 20.9 million views within 24 hours since its upload on YouTube.
As of 4:15 pm on May 12, the video has received more than 12 million views.
Chay ngay di is a hip-hop mixed with R&B song composed by Son Tung M-TP himself.
The music video features the singer as a handsome, affluent man, who always looks for true love but ends up meeting a beautiful girl, who wants nothing but his money.
The man was so badly hurt that he even wanted to kill the girl, but stopped just in time and told her to “run now”.
“While I was composing the song, I imagined the story in my head. I dedicate this music video to the audience for better understanding about my compositions,” the young singer have shared before the video launch.
On his official YouTube channel, with more than 2.4 million subscribers, Tung also has a number of hit videos, three of which have passed the 130-million-view mark.
Vietnam is now home to more than 80,000 skilled foreign workers, according to Le Quang Trung, deputy head of the Department of Employment under the Ministry of Labour, Invalids and Social Affairs (MOLISA).
According to a report by Vietnam News, they come from over 100 countries and territories and work as managers, managing directors, experts and technical workers, among other professions, Trung said at a meeting on employment hosted by the ministry in the southern province of Binh Duong on Thursday.
As much as 95 per cent of eligible foreign workers in Vietnam have been granted work permits, he said, adding that they provide a significant contingent of skilled, experienced and professional workers for Vietnam.
However, he noted that there is a lack of close, timely and comprehensive coordination in managing foreign labourers among local authorised agencies, while violations have not been strictly handled.
The sense of law observance of some contractors, businesses and foreign workers in recruiting, employing labourers and following work permit regulations remains limited. He noted that some foreigners do enter Việt Nam before applying for work permits.
The increasing number of foreign workers in Vietnam requires subsequent improvements in the legal system to ensure the rights of migrant workers, especially with regard to social security.
Social insurance authorities in the country have developed a compulsory social insurance scheme for foreign workers in Vietnam, citing the need to follow international practices as the country deepens its integration into the global community.
The 2014 Law on Social Insurance requires compulsory enrollment of foreign workers in the social insurance scheme, starting in 2018, to ensure their welfare. However, this has not yet been realised due to a lack of guiding documents.
A MoLISA draft decree also proposed that foreign workers be required to take part in all five social insurance programmes including pensions and insurance for sickness, maternity, and cover for injuries, disease, or death in the workplace
Vietnam and China have announced plans to expand cross-border self-driving tours to boost tourism in the two countries.
Xinhua reports, in June 2018, China and Vietnam will launch cross-border self-driving routes from the southern Chinese cities of Guilin and Fangchenggang, to Mong Cai and Ha Long City in Vietnam.
The original self-driving route was launched between Fangchenggang and Mong Cai in November 2016. Vietnam has allowed the northern Quang Ninh province to pilot self-drive tours from China to Ha Long city since March.
Self-driving tours through the Vietnam-China border have become popular after the launch of the Fangchenggang to Mong Cai route. The number of outbound tourists from Fangchenggang rose to more than 3.1 million in 2017.
The man, previously given a three-year imprisonment, was sentenced to 18 months on probation by an appeal court
According to a report by Tuoi Tre newspaper, a1940-born Vietnamese man who was last November handed a jail term of three years for lewd acts against two preteen girls had his sentence reduced to 18 months on probation at a court of appeals on Friday.
Nguyen Khac Thuy, 78, who lives in the southern province of Ba Ria – Vung Tau, Vietnam was charged with committing lewd acts on two girls, aged six and 11, in separate cases in April and May 2014, according to court documents.
Nguyen Khac Thuy is seen at an appeal court in Ba Ria – Vung Tau Province, southern Vietnam, on May 11, 2018. Photo: Tuoi Tre
In the first case, the elderly man touched the sensitive parts of the six-year-old girl and was later scolded and hit in the face by the victim’s father.
In the second incident, the victim was talking with a friend in her apartment when Thuy appeared and put his hand through the door to commit lewd acts on her.
Thuy pleaded not guilty to both charges of child molestation, but the court of Vung Tau City in November 2017 declared his appeal inadmissible, ruling that there was sufficient evidence to charge him.
The court then sentenced him to three years behind bars.
On Friday, however, an appeal court in Ba Ria – Vung Tau ruled that there was not enough evidence to charge him for the second incident, involving the 11-year-old girl, and found Thuy guilty in the first case only.
Nguyen Khac Thuy, 78, facing to judicial panels
The court therefore reduced the jail term to 18 months and allowed him to serve the sentence on probation instead of in prison.
Huynh Ngoc Thien, the president of appeal court, who chaired the judicial panels.
Ba Ria – Vung Tau police had previously demanded that that the 78-year-old be charged for molesting as many as four preteen girls.
The owner had his staff swipe the customer’s credit cards multiple times.
HCM City People’s Court on Friday sentenced a restaurant owner to seven years in jail for misappropriating more than VND683 million (US$31,100) from an Australian client. Tran Tuan Minh, 23, of southern Ben Tre province is the director of NighFall Restaurant Ltd Company in District 1.
On August 11, 2016, Australian national Caracciolo David John, 45, and a group of friends visited Minh’s restaurant, had dinner and played bar billiards. John used two cards – a Visa and a Master – from two Australian banks to pay the bill, which came up to VND23 million (nearly $1,000). However, several days later, after returning to Australia, John discovered that AU$39,429 (VNĐ683 million/US$31,100) had been withdrawn from his accounts. Minh got his staff to swipe the cards 10 times and withdraw more money than John’s bill amount.
The bank receipt shows that the Nightfall restaurant staff swiped the victim’s cards eight times and withdrew VND683 million. – Photo vietnamplus.vn
Minh also forged the signature of the card holder to withdraw money at a bank the following day. At the court, Minh admitted that he misappropriated the money because his business suffered difficulties. The misappropriated money was hidden in his motorbike’s trunk. His family mortgaged its house to compensate for the fraud.
Southeast Asian stock markets closed higher on Friday, in line with broader Asia, as investor risk appetite got a boost after softer US inflation data soothed worries of faster rate hikes by the Federal Reserve.
According to Reuters report, the US consumer prices rose less than expected in April, suggesting that inflation was increasing at a moderate pace.
“The rally in regional markets reflects the US markets performance last night after the inflation data eased concerns of a possible Fed tightening moving forward,” said Lexter Azurin, a senior equity analyst at Manila-based AB Capital Securities.
Asia shares ex-Japan rose nearly 1%, with investors also cheering US-North Korean steps to further ease tensions in the Korean Peninsula.
In Southeast Asia, Philippine shares closed 2.4% higher, a day after the central bank hiked the benchmark interest rates to 3.25%.
Financials and industrials were among the top boosts with power generator Aboitiz Equity ventures rising 6% and BDO Unibank ending 3.3% higher.
“Most analysts were citing that recent inflation figures have in a way signalled that the BSP (Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas) might be behind the curve, so it was viewed positively by the markets today,” Azurin said.
Philippine shares gained 2.7% this week, the most since April 2017.
Vietnam stocks erased early falls to close 1.6% higher, while Malaysia was closed for a public holiday after general elections.
Indonesian stocks jumped nearly 2% in intraday trading before closing 0.8% higher.
Mining contractor United Tractors gained 7%, while Bank Negara Indonesia climbed 2.8%.
Bank Indonesia said the rupiah’s level was not reflecting fundamentals and that it had ample room to adjust the rate, giving another hint that it might raise rates to support the currency.
Singapore shares ended nearly 1% higher, with DBS Group Holdings rising 2.2% and United Overseas Bank up 2.3%.
Data out on Friday showed that the city-state’s retail sales in March fell 1.5% from a year earlier, as sales of motor vehicles as well as computer and telecommunications equipment dropped.
The United States Agency for International Development (USAID) and the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development (MARD) on Friday officially launched the USAID Saving Species project.
U.S. Ambassador Daniel J. Kritenbrink, Permanent Deputy Minister of MARD Dr. Ha Cong Tuan, representatives of the MARD Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species Management Authority of Vietnam, and other government and NGO stakeholders attended the launch. A report by Dan Tri international version mentioned.
“USAID Saving Species is not just a commitment between the U.S. and Vietnamese governments, it will also link to the efforts of other organizations, within Vietnam and beyond, who are committed to combating wildlife trafficking. Only by working together can we solve this global issue,” said Ambassador Kritenbrink.
With a budget of approximately USD10 million, USAID Saving Species supports the Government of Vietnam to combat wildlife trafficking through three integrated and mutually reinforcing objectives: harmonizing and improving the legal framework for wildlife crime; strengthening and improving law enforcement and prosecution of wildlife crime; and reducing consumer demand for illegal wildlife products.
The project’s focal species are rhinos, elephants, and pangolins, and targeted geographic locations include major cities such as Hanoi, Ho Chi Minh City, and Danang, as well as transit points for the illegal trade, such as border crossings, ports, and airports.
Singapore-based United Overseas Bank (UOB) will open its first branch in Vietnam on July 2. It is the ninth wholly foreign-owned bank and first Singaporean bank in the country.
According to a report by Vietnam News Agency, UOB Vietnam has a charter capital of VNĐ3 trillion (US$131.3 million) and has permission to operate in Vietnam for 99 years.
On March 23 last year, State Bank of Vietnam (SBV) announced that it had given preliminary approval to UOB to set up a branch in Việt Nam during a visit of Singaporean Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong to the country. The bank received the in-principle licence in July last year.
Under the licence, the bank can expand its network in the country, enabling UOB to extend financial support and offer best-in-class products and services to consumers and businesses beyond HCM City.
UOB was founded in 1935. Since then, the bank has developed a global network of more than 500 offices in 19 countries in Asia Pacific, Europe and North America.
In 2013, UOB set up the FDI Advisory Unit in Việt Nam, its ninth unit in the region, to offer integrated services to its clients expanding their businesses within the country and across borders.
UOB has also been promoting Việt Nam as an investment destination, supporting its regional clients venturing into and expanding within the country.
In 2015, UOB signed a Memorandum of Understanding with Vietnam’s Foreign Investment Agency to facilitate trade and investment between Việt Nam and Southeast Asia.
Apart from UOB Vietnam, eight other foreign banks operating in the country are HSBC (Hong Kong), ANZ (Australia), Standard Chartered (United Kingdom), Shinhan Vietnam (South Korea), Hong Leong Bank, CIMB and Public Bank Berhad (Malaysia) and CitiBank (United States).
Vietnamese manufacturers are having difficulties in distributing their products as foreign retailers control modern distribution channels.
Many businesspeople say that it is becoming more difficult to bring their goods to large supermarkets for sale.
Nguyen Thanh Hung from Hung Tan Farm Produce said he has to go through many stages to have his products displayed on supermarket shelves.
As the procedures are time-consuming, it takes five to seven days on average for farm produce to be available at supermarkets.
Meanwhile, supermarkets are ordering goods in small quantities each time, so the company has to pay more for transportation fees.
Other businesses complain that as supermarkets defer payment for goods, they do not have capital to maintain production.
“Supermarkets promise to make payments within 30 days, but they often deliberately delay the payment. I know many small businesses don’t have money for re-investment,” a businessman said.
He said that supermarkets require discount rates of 23-25 percent.
“Because of this reason, I have postponed my plan to enter supermarkets for two years,” he complained.
Nguyen Vinh Phu, former chair of the Hanoi Supermarket Association, confirmed that in Vietnam products have to go through many intermediaries before reaching consumers.
As a result, manufacturers make modest profits and consumers have to buy goods at unreasonably high prices, while retailers and intermediaries enjoy the biggest profits in supply chains.
“I have enough evidence to prove that some retailers are blocking suppliers by many kinds of charges and fees. This will discourage suppliers and manufacturers, and will kill domestic production,” Phu said.
The problem, according to Phu, is that foreign retailers are dominating modern retail channels.
Foreign retailers have been flocking to Vietnam in recent years. With advantages in capital, technology and business experience, they are keeping the upper hand over domestic ones.
Analysts estimate that modern retail channels (supermarkets, convenience stores and minimarts) make up 50 percent of total sales. This means that those who control the retail channels will have big power and a decisive voice in supply activities.
In other words, they have the power to set quality standards, distribution conditions and discount rates, and decide which products they will sell.
The director of a seafood company confirmed that Vietnamese manufacturers now depend on modern distribution channels, so they have to accept the requirements set by retailers.
“We have fallen into a dilemma. If we enter supermarkets, we will have to pay too many expenses which eat into our profits. But if we don’t, we will miss an important distribution channel,” he said.
Not including Vietnamese labels and selling Chinese goods under Korean and Japanese brands are the newest scandals erupting from several stores of Korea-based Mumuso, Japan-based Miniso, and Daiso in Vietnam.
Korean media has just expressed suspicion that Mumuso stores are falsely assuming Korean origins because its headquarters is located in China. Furthermore, in Korea Mumuso is completely unheard of and has no retail stores.
According to newswire laodong.vn, many Mumuso stores in Hanoi are offering products labeled “Mumuso–Korea” but are of Chinese origins. In addition, a representative of Mumuso also mentioned that the company imports goods from a third party, meaning that good go from Korea to China and then to Vietnam.
To clarify this issue, VIR contacted Mumuso Vietnam and were told that the company will organise a press conference “at the nearest time” to clear up queries.
Not only Mumuso, but many other retail brands, including Miniso and Daiso were caught up in this scandal.
In particular, despite describing itself as a Japanese retailer giant, Miniso only has four stores in Japan, but 1,100 stores in China.
A source of laodong.vn also stated that despite setting foot in Vietnam in September 2016, Miniso’s products are not labelled in Vietnamese and do not carry Conformity to Regulation (CR) stamps in accordance with Vietnamese regulations, making consumers worried about the quality and the ingredients of the goods.
Thuy Chi (Cau Giay district, Hanoi), a Miniso buyer, said: “Many products at Miniso have no Vietnamese labels, which makes it difficult to understand their uses, and I have to ask the salesclerks for help before purchasing.”
Similar to Mumuso, Miniso’s representative also declined to comment to VIR, saying the company will provide official answers as soon as possible.
According to the Hanoi Market Management Department, all import goods have to be labelled in Vietnamese, including the name of the importer, the product, instruction manuals, and ingredients. If distributors do not label their imported goods in Vietnamese, they will be punished in accordance with Vietnamese regulations.
Vietnam is one of the cheapest countries in Asia Pacific to buy a pack of cigarettes.
Vietnam’s Ministry of Health has proposed a higher fixed tax rate on cigarettes in the hope of reducing the numbers of adolescence smokers, from a proposed VND1,000 to VND2,000-5,000.
During a workshop on Tobacco Taxation organized by Oxfam on May 8, Deputy Director of the Tobacco Control Fund Phan Thi Hai said that a higher tax rate will increase government funds. “It will also prevent adolescents and poor people from purchasing more cigarettes.”
The idea follows a proposal by the Ministry of Finance proposed that offered two options for taxing tobacco in the amended Tax Administration Law.
The first option would be a combination of a special consumption percentage tax and a fixed tax. So a 20-pack of cigarettes would cost an additional VND1,000 (4.40 cents) in fixed tax, and each cigar VND1,500.
Option two is increasing the special consumption tax each year until it reaches up to 85 percent in 2021.
Health officials are supporting the first option, but said the fixed tax should be VND2,000-5,000.
Special consumption tax on tobacco in Vietnam is calculated on the warehouse price, which is roughly 35 percent of the retail price, compared to the world’s average rate of 59 percent, according to World Health Organization statistics from 2017. It is also much lower than Thailand’s 75 percent, Brunei’s 81 percent and Malaysia’s 57 percent. This has made Vietnam one of the cheapest countries in Asia Pacific to buy cigarettes.
There are 16 million smokers in Vietnam, while there are 33 million non-smokers who inhale secondary smoke at home. Tobacco smoke contains more than 7,000 chemicals. Cigarettes cause 25 types of diseases, such as cancer and cardiovascular diseases. About 100 million people worldwide were killed by tobacco-related diseases in the 20th century. Each year, tobacco causes nearly six million deaths, and that could rise to eight million in 2020.
The accession of Vietnam, a formerly antagonistic communist neighbour, to ASEAN was the result of several major geostrategic power shifts that continue to impact on the grouping’s development today.
Conflict in Vietnam in the 1960s and 70s provided the context for the genesis of ASEAN. Despite the hard feelings original member states held towards each other during the period of decolonisation and Cold War tension, Thailand, Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore and the Philippines agreed to work together to shield themselves from the domino effect of communist expansion. ASEAN’s diplomatic response to Vietnam’s 1978 intervention in Cambodia remains the organisation’s biggest success.
The threat of communism brought together a group of dissimilar interests and provided a reason for ASEAN to unite. When it subsided in the 1990s, Vietnam’s regional integration became a necessity and the former adversary acceded to ASEAN in 1995. This marked one of the most meaningful transitions in the region’s history — Southeast Asia had embraced its political and ideological diversity and overcome Cold War bipolarity.
ASEAN was a critical platform for Vietnam to break out from its diplomatic isolation, re-engage with its neighbourhood and indirectly move towards normalising its relationship with the United States. Vietnam’s accession to ASEAN entailed an adjustment in the original members’ strategic thinking and additional considerations of ASEAN’s economic goals. Post-war Vietnam was significantly less developed than the ‘ASEAN 6’. It was grouped into the ‘second tier ASEAN’ group alongside newcomers Cambodia, Laos and Myanmar for which separate arrangements were made in regards to economic integration.
Vietnam’s successful transformation from an external threat into a fellow member state can be seen as the best example of a member state adopting ASEAN principles. Vietnam is now one of the most active members of the organisation. Under the pressure generated by rivalry between the United States and China, Hanoi has been consistent in insisting that ASEAN play a role in dispute management.
Vietnam has also vocally supported multilateral ASEAN initiatives, such as the ASEAN Regional Forum, to uphold the rules-based order and stability of the region. The continuity of Vietnam’s domestic leadership, alongside Singapore, means that its ruling elites still maintain the original vision held by the founders of ASEAN. Unlike Southeast Asian democracies such as Indonesia, the Philippines and Thailand (which have experienced power transitions that somewhat undermined their commitment to ASEAN), Vietnam’s outlook on the strategic importance of the group has remained consistent.
Vietnam’s accession has been a mutually beneficial process: ASEAN was the bridge to Vietnam’s liberalisation and connection with the world when the United States was still isolating it from global opportunities. Likewise, the inclusion of Indochinese states reinvented ASEAN into a regional grouping that included maritime and mainland Southeast Asia.
For half a century the region has shaped ASEAN as an institution while ASEAN has framed the conduct of regional politics. After decades of expansion, however, ASEAN is struggling to adjust to new shifts in power, particularly the rise of China. The organisation also suffers from a need to reform itself internally.
Increasing influence by China on individual member states has led to the abuse of ASEAN norms, including the principle of consensus. Growing frustration about this ineffective practice has led to internal discussion about the possibility of a new ‘ASEAN–X’ approach, where issues are resolved among those that are willing or are directly concerned with the problem at hand. While this idea is still in the making, it signals that the innate diversity and different priorities within ASEAN make it increasingly hard to reach ‘consensus’. The pending membership application of Timor Leste, if successful, will only lead ASEAN towards even deeper heterogeneity.
Timor Leste’s pending membership may only further strain ASEAN unity. But it does offer a useful case-study for those who also contemplate joining. This takes the edge off one of the oldest arguments against Australia’s joining ASEAN: that it differs too much from the group. While Australia’s difference is indisputable, that is not the main show-stopper.
The main obstacle to Australian membership is not related to how unified ASEAN is but rather the lack of ASEAN leadership. Before the membership debate, Canberra should ask if it has a vision of the leadership it can offer to ASEAN and what sort of leadership it is willing to follow.
The strategic considerations for Australia to join ASEAN differ from those that were imperative for Vietnam or the Indochinese members in the post-Cold War context. Joining ASEAN is optional for Canberra, and the rationale for Australia to consider joining the club is to better position itself in a region with a stronger China. But whether belonging to the ASEAN group can shield Australia from a more omnipresent China is an open question.
Even so, this debate is an opportunity for Australia to lever existing ASEAN platforms such as the East Asia Summit and ASEAN Regional Forum to assert its status as the oldest and closest ASEAN dialogue partner. Unlike other key major dialogue partners whose current political contexts have shifted their immediate focus away from ASEAN (such as the United States, China, Russia, India, Japan and the EU), Australia is in the position to demonstrate support for this regional institution.
Vietnam’s ASEAN success story should give Australia a reference point that ASEAN is able to adjust geopolitical needs. ASEAN membership does not necessarily give more leverage. It is a question of what Canberra wants from ASEAN and whether it has really made most of the existing frameworks of dialogue and strategic partnership.
By Huong Le Thu – senior analyst at Australia Strategic Policy Institute.
Huobi.Pro, the world’s fourth largest digital asset exchange, announced today the agenda and speakers for the 2018 Blockchain Festival in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam on May 24-25.
Hosted by Huobi.Pro, the two-day Blockchain Festival will feature more than 30 speakers, including keynotes from Le Ngoc Giang (Ministry of Justice of Vietnam The Road Ahead for Vietnam Blockchain Industry) and Dr. David Nguyen (President of Vietnam Chamber of Commerce Singapore, Chairman of Regulus Investment & Capital Holdings).
Dr. Nguyen said, “Vietnam is becoming more and more important on the global blockchain map. As such, Vietnam needs more help from global leaders in the blockchain industry, like Huobi. We are grateful to Huobi for organizing ‘Blockchain Festival Vietnam’, which represents an important milestone for Vietnam’s blockchain development. We hope that this festival will help to increase the awareness level to the public including the ICT businesses, students, and universities.”
Attendees of Huobi.Pro’s Blockchain Festival Vietnam will have the chance to meet blockchain industry leaders such as Loi Luu (Founder of Kyber Network), Larry Liu (Founder of Genaro Network), Li Pu (Chief Technology Officer of Achain), Mikhail Mironov (Head of Partnership at ICORating) and more.
Fueled by a young population with a high rate of smartphone usage and large batches of IT graduates each year, Vietnam has become one of the fastest growing economies. In Southeast Asia, Vietnam has been dubbed “the blockchain country to watch” because of the country’s high-tech literacy and engineering resources. According to the World Economic Forum, Vietnam has ranked among the top 10 countries for producing engineering talent.
“Huobi organized the Blockchain Festival in Vietnam to bring industry knowledge, insight, and experts to one of the fastest growing markets in the blockchain and crypto landscape,” said Wu Xing, Senior Director of Huobi.Pro. “There has been a surge in demand from the Vietnamese market and we hope that by opening up new opportunities here, we can have a positive impact on both the local economy and ecosystem.“
The Blockchain Festival’s 1,500+ attendees will descend upon the Gem Center, Vietnam’s premier event venue with 10,000 square meters of conference and exhibition space. To view the full agenda, please visit https://www.blockchainfestival.com/.
New Yorker Neal Bermas had traveled around the world, but Vietnam literally stopped him in his tracks.
There, the businessman saw starving children in Ho Chi Minh City while on a trip to Asia in 1999.
“There were bands of these poor, homeless kids on the streets … and they were begging for milk, not for money,” Bermas said. “It stayed with me.”
Bermas, who did consulting for hotels and restaurants, saw there was an effort under way to help street kids get simple food service jobs. He realized he could help.
Combining his business savvy with an ambitious nonprofit model, in 2007 he co-founded STREETS International, based in Hoi An. The organization provides at-risk young people with a rigorous 18-month training program, preparing them for careers in Vietnam’s booming culinary and hospitality industries.
“(They) come from the whole country with all kinds of very, very difficult paths,” Bermas said. “We offer them a structured program and a very rich apprenticing experience.”
STREETS’ participants range in age from 16 to 22. The group provides housing, meals, medical care, clothing and support services to help trainees gain skills and confidence for employment at top resorts.
Some come from more than 600 miles away to participate in the free program. They receive a stipend and transportation assistance to visit their family.
“We build possibilities and aspirations for those communities,” Bermas said. “Where we take one young person from the village, suddenly … the whole village starts to think about, ‘maybe my kid, too.'”
Currently, 75 trainees are enrolled. The group’s full-time staff and teachers are all Vietnamese, and Bermas often brings in chefs and other experts to enhance the training.
He and his team work with the government and ensure they follow all safety and labor laws and regulations.
By the end of this year, nearly 250 young people will have completed the program. Bermas said 100% of STREETS graduates have found employment, mostly at four- and five-star hotels in Vietnam.
“It works. And that’s a push to do more to reach more young people,” he said, adding that the group stays in regular contact with all graduates for at least two years after graduation, most longer.
Bermas plans to expand the program to other areas of the country.
CNN’s Allie Torgan spoke with Bermas about his work. Below is an edited version of their conversation.
Who are the young people applying to your program?
Bermas: All the young people in our program come from poverty — without enough to eat, without electricity and plumbing. From leprosy villages, from HIV backgrounds; some have been trafficked, sometimes more than once.
Part of the process of selecting and getting to know the trainees is that we visit wherever they’re from — the home, in many cases the orphanage, the NGO, the isolated village, sometimes even a street corner. We want to know the most about them we possibly can, how difficult their conditions have been and how they have been wounded by life. Or what support there is. It’s a great resource to a young person’s development in our program.
This is the first real chance for many (of them) to transition from poverty and life on the streets to the dignity of self-sufficiency that comes with a successful career. You shouldn’t discount a young person’s future because of their past, no matter how dire it’s been.
You’ve created an extensive program. Besides the hands-on culinary and hospitality training, what else is involved?
Bermas: There’s a whole team of colleagues, educators and professionals who have worked developing all this. We have daily curriculums and lesson plans, from the first day to the last day — designed to deliver quite sophisticated, substantive material.
We have a computer language lab. We have tutoring every day of the week. English language instruction is a big part. And a whole array of life skills, from hygiene to CPR, budgeting and banking, physical exercise and being healthy.
Depending on which track the trainees are going, they have classroom experience in a small teaching kitchen if they’re becoming professional chefs, or in the classroom to learn about hospitality and service. And our three eateries have many purposes; each one brings a different set of skills for apprenticing.
You left Manhattan behind to do this. Why did you decide to move to Vietnam?
Bermas: The truth is, the early vision was that I would work with colleagues and assemble a team here. And I could travel back and forth and make sure everything was going well.
It became clear very early on that if I was to really realize this ambition on behalf of the young people in the program, I would have to be here and do it. It was probably the best, if not certainly the most meaningful, decision I’ve made in my adult life.
This work at STREETS is never easy, but it’s important. I know now that I need to be sure there is a STREETS around 10 years from now.
You’ve kept your focus on the local community. How have they embraced you?
Bermas: It’s traditional here in Vietnam when you open a new business that the business community and friends and family all send you large wreaths of flowers opening day to wish you good luck.
The day we opened the restaurant — we’d been working so hard to open, to get this thing going — and I came down the street, and there were so many of these big, beautiful wreaths full of flowers that said in Vietnamese, “Congratulations” and “Welcome.” And who had sent them? All the local shops and friends we had made. I was so touched by this.
The flowers poured out into the street. It was amazing. I literally couldn’t get in the front door of the restaurant.
SwipeRx enables 80,000 pharmacy professionals across Southeast Asia to learn, collaborate, and communicate, ultimately improving healthcare outcomes for the 100 million patients they serve across the region.
Over the last 15 months since its launch in January 2017, SwipeRx now counts over 80,000 pharmacy professionals as registered users of the platform, including 1 in every 3 pharmacists in Indonesia and 1 in every 2 in the Philippines.
SwipeRx’s rapid growth across Southeast Asia can be attributed to the fact that it addresses several real needs in the practice. Prior to the advent of SwipeRx, pharmacy professionals tended to be overlooked by NGOs, government agencies, and pharmaceutical companies, largely because it was hard to even access them. Pharmacies in Southeast Asia were a fragmented network, composed mostly of mom-and-pop operations and other small chains – in Vietnam, for example, this demographic comprises 90% of the 40,000 pharmacies.
Connecting these pharmacists on a single platform like SwipeRx is important because of how crucial they are to numerous major health problems. This includes their role in lifestyle advising, such as proper nutrition, weight loss for obesity, and smoking cessation, as well as treating chronic issues like diabetes or hypertension.
SwipeRx’s success in empowering pharmacists as front-line healthcare professionals is evident in how fully the platform is being integrated into the daily lives of users, for practically every part of their profession.
When pharmacists need more information about a particular medicine, they open up SwipeRx and look it up in the drug information tool, which catalogues all the registered drugs in those countries. More than 16,000 pharmacists have used this feature, and more do so every day.
When pharmacists need advice from trusted peers, they turn to SwipeRx’s discussion board, where they can pose questions to the platform’s audience of 80,000 pharmacy professionals. Over 10,000 answers have been received to questions asked on the platform demonstrating how pharmacy professionals are helping each other to solve public health challenges. SwipeRx’s users get help in everything from reading a prescription with tough penmanship to understanding the nuances of local regulation.
Most significantly, over 5,000 pharmacists now turn to SwipeRx to complete the continuing professional development (CPD) modules they need to renew their license since the launch of this feature in late 2017. In doing so, these pharmacists were able to avoid the hassle of having to take time off work and commute to a physical center to earn their CPD.
Farouk Meralli, the CEO and founder of mClinica, the health-tech organization behind SwipeRx, is proud that the platform is now playing such an integral role in the daily lives of pharmacists, but believes there is still a long way to go toward accomplishing the company’s goal of transforming healthcare in the region.
“SwipeRx’s early success has validated the problem we want to solve: Pharmacists in Southeast Asia need better tools and resources, as they have been traditionally overlooked in public health. We put pharmacy professionals first. Developing SwipeRx as the central hub for pharmacy professionals is only important inasmuch as what it signifies: They’ll be able to provide better service to hundreds of millions of patients across Asia,” said Meralli, who noted that SwipeRx’s existing user base already reaches over 100 million patients monthly.
As Meralli shared, pharmacists have been largely overlooked in the healthcare value chain in favor of doctors, and this trend applies all the more to certain segments of the profession, such as women and those operating in rural areas. Fortunately, SwipeRx extends inclusion to these sub-groups, who have adapted the platform en masse: Of the platform’s 80,000 users, more than 70% are female and another 34% work at pharmacies in rural areas.
mClinica Chief Operating Officer Vasil Rusinov noted that the health-tech organization is particularly conscious of how it helps these groups.
“Pharmacists and pharmacy assistants play an important role in strengthening health care within their communities. Yet they have been often neglected when it comes to technological information. Helping this segments of the pharmacy profession is especially important to us as an organization as it’s in line with our mission to improve public health at scale. With SwipeRx we can help them help their communities get the front-line healthcare they deserve,” said Rusinov.
