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Dr. Tran Viet Thai

PANEL 3: Perspectives from the UN Member States
 Dr-Tran-Viet-Thai Dr. Tran Viet Thai
President, Tanzania Red Cross Society (Tanzania)

He graduated in agricultural engineering in 1988 and pursued post-graduate studies in renewable energy and environment science, business administration and philosophy which best position him to deal with complex development processes. His life-long involvement in humanitarian service delivery as a Red Cross volunteer and a rural development advocate in Tanzania project his enormous experiences in leadership and management towards achieving national and international cooperation development goals. He has written several books on political philosophy and served as a Member of the East African Parliament from 2001 to 2012; and was elected the President of the Tanzania Red Cross Society and subsequently Member of the International Federation of the Red Cross (IFRC) Governing Board from 2013 to 2015. He is currently an entrepreneur and a Doctor of Business Administration Scholar on Contract Farming Research with Maastricht School of Management and the East and Southern African Management Institute (ESAMI).

DR. TRAN VIET THAI, the Deputy Director-General of the Institute for Foreign Strategic Studies at the Diplomatic Academy of Vietnam, started his remarks by mentioning the Diplomatic Academy of Vietnam coordinating with various organizations in Vietnam to review how Vietnam has been so far in implementing the MDGs, initiated by the United Nations. He underlined that Vietnam have accomplished at least 3 goals of 2015, in advance.

Dr. Thai underlined that the first lesson they realized after reviewing is that the government of Vietnam has a very high political will and commitment in implementing the MDGs. Especially in September 2000, Dr. Thai said that Vietnam`s President has emphasized that Vietnam is strongly committed to being a rapid, efficient, and sustainable development society, in which economic growth goes hand-to-hand with social progresses, justice and environmental protections. He underlined that the second lesson is that good governance and strong institutions. According to Dr. Thai, the definition of good governance and strong institutions, is that it must consist of a system of south policies, effective regulatory mechanisms, and practical allies.

Dr. Thai said, “I would like to emphasize that practical allies are extremely important. We have to go down localities, to match what we have, what’re our policy terms and what are the practice, and match it with each other.” The second component of this lesson, as Dr. Thai underlined, is effective bureaucracies and strong institutions with high political values, south policies and plans, and preconditions for successfully implementing the MDGs.

Dr. Thai also emphasized that the role of education, Vietnam’s National Committee for Advancement of Women, and the association of veterans in Vietnam important in coordinating projects, in channeling funds, and in implementing the MDGs. Moving on to the third lesson that Vietnam has drawn out is that innovation and creativeness. Dr. Thai underlined that among these creative things, we have already localized the energy by inventing our own Millennium Goals of Vietnam. We call it MGV. He finds this fact very important because sometimes the goals here are general, so we need to make them practical and suitable for localities. He said that the localities are based on implementing. Dr. Thai emphases that Vietnam also intercept the goals of the MDGs with the goal in national, local, and sectorial economic and social development strategies of Vietnam, which is very important. According to him poverty reduction is one of the one of the biggest successes in Vietnam so far, in implementing the MDGs.