A football game at the Bắc Giang Stadium, which has been converted into a youth training centre by the Hanoi T&T Sports Joint Stock Company.

BẮC GIANG — A focus on culture and sport - including a new national-standard athletics stadium - that is the commitment of the northern mountain province of Bắc Giang.

The province will be investing in both from now until 2025, according to Vice Chairman of the Provincial People's Committee, Mai Sơn.

The pinnacle will be, according to the provincial authority official, the construction of its Cultural and Exhibition Centre, which is due to be completed soon and put into operation by 2025. The centre is built on an area of more than 13,260sq.m and designed in the shape of a phoenix and will include an indoor exhibition and display space, an art performance area, a cinema, a conference room and a work area for staff.

There will also be an outdoor exhibition hall and other auxiliary structures including a flower garden, a power station and a guard house.

In 2025, the province will also be renovating and upgrading the main library into a comprehensively developed unit, with digital and automation of the systems. It will also build a centralised book cataloging area and another centre for providing scientific information - collecting, preserving and promoting the national cultural heritage documents within the library archives.

The new-look Bắc Giang Stadium is now a football training centre.

In addition in 2025, Bắc Giang will continue to focus on attracting investments in building non-public cultural and sports institutions such as golf courses, cinemas, swimming pools, private libraries, private museums, multi-purpose sports training facilities, outdoor sports fields and entertainment areas.

It will continuously concentrate investment resources in completing the construction of four new Cultural - Sports Centres in the districts of Yên Thế, Hiệp Hòa, Việt Yên and Bắc Giang City by 2025.

Investment will be poured into renovating, upgrading and building new ones in other localities to ensure 100 per cent of communes, wards and towns in the province have cultural houses. Seventy per cent of communes have multi-purpose cultural houses with a minimum area of ​​300 sq.m and a sports zone of ​​at least 1,200 sq.m (excluding stadiums). By 2025, between 60-70 per cent of villages, hamlets and residential areas in the province will have cultural houses with a minimum area of ​​200 sq.m and a sports area of ​​at least 300 sq.m.

Bắc Giang Provincial Sports Stadium was put in operation in 2019 to serve domestic and international sports tournaments.

Bắc Giang will review, supplement and adjust the land-use plan, set up boundary markers of locations for the construction of cultural and sports facilities of the province, towns, cities, districts, communes and wards and promptly issue right certificates for existing or newly built works.

It encourages the application of models and typical designs in the construction of communal and village cultural houses to build synchronously, reduce costs and improve their operation quality.

The women's doubles final of the 2024 National Badminton Team Championship for the 8th Li-ning Cup held at Bắc Giang Provincial Sports Stadium

The province will increase its call for support from organisations, businesses and individuals to invest in building cultural and sports facilities in the area.

It will seek investment from the Government and encourage economic sectors to participate in cultural and sports activities. It will increase investments in culture and sports in the form of public-private partnerships, especially in new urban areas and promote the role and responsibility of investors and businesses in building facilities for workers.

Currently, Bắc Giang has 10/10 cultural information centres, one provincial library, ten district libraries, 59 commune libraries, over 500 grassroots bookcases, 534 sports training and competition houses and 7,061 outdoor sports training and competition grounds.

The system of provincial cultural and sports institutions under the management of the province's People's Committee includes seven key provincial centres including a cinema complex, a provincial museum and library, a sports stadium and a chèo theatre.

Some events of the 31st SEA Games Việt Nam 2021 took place in the Bắc Giang Provincial Sports Stadium.

Bắc Giang plans to build a new national-standard stadium in Hương Gián Commune, Yên Dũng District which will be merged into Bắc Giang City at the end of this year, with a capacity of 40,000 seats, expected to be invested in the period 2025 - 2030.

Over the same time frame, the province also plans to invest in building a traditional art performance theatre on the site of Bắc Giang Chèo Theatre with about 300 seats.

In addition, the province currently also has a system of private cultural and sport institution such as Bắc Giang Lotte Cinema complex managed by Lotte Group, Be Cineplex Bắc Giang cinema complex managed by Be Media Joint Stock Company and a network of football stadiums, tennis courts and swimming pools run by tourism companies and businesses.

A football match between the host team Bắc Giang (white) and Viettel Sports (red) at the National Youth Football Tournament (U13) for the Yamaha Cup 2024, qualifying round for the Northern region, held at Bắc Giang Provincial Sports Stadium.

Vice Chairman of the People's Council of Bắc Giang, Nghiêm Xuân Hưởng, said to effectively invest, manage and use local cultural and sports institutions, the provincial Department of Culture, Sports and Tourism and localities will study to promulgate appropriate mechanisms and policies to attract, mobilise and effectively use social resources for the system of cultural and sports institutions at grassroot levels, especially those in communes and villages and industrial parks.

A training plan should be built up to improve the level of political theory, professional expertise and skills for officials, civil servants and public employees working in local cultural and sports centres, he said.

Tạ Hữu Tùng, Vice Chairman of the People's Committee of Lãng Sơn Commune, Yên Dũng District, said the commune has chosen a cultural house as the key target.

The commune has also allocated land to build and expand cultural and sports facilities, while mobilising funds to upgrade the works, according to Tùng.

Players compete in the rapid chess event at the 2024 National Youth Chess Championship for the DOPPELHERZ Cup organised by the Bắc Giang's Department of Culture, Sports and Tourism in coordination with the Department of Physical Education and Sports and the Việt Nam Chess Federation at Bắc Giang Provincial Sports Stadium.

"Currently, all villages in the commune have their own standard cultural houses. In addition to the cultural house with a capacity of 200-300 seats, there are also auxiliary works such as kitchens, toilets and sports yards with a total area of between ​​1,200 sq.m to 5,000 sq.m each," Tùng said.

Nguyễn Thị Hoa, Head of the Aerobic Club of Nam Giang 1 Residential Group, Xương Giang Ward, Băc Giang City, said: "The newly-built cultural house in the local residential area is spacious and well-equipped, creating conditions for the club with more than 70 members to practice regularly every day. The club's activities aim to contribute to improving health and promoting cultural and sports movements in the local residential area." VNS