A three-year MoU on comprehensive communication cooperation was inked by representatives of the Vietnam News Agency's (VNA) southern representative office and the Việt Nam National University HCM City (VNU-HCM) in HCM City on September 13. — VNS Photo Nguyễn Diệp

HCM CITY — The Vietnam News Agency's (VNA) southern representative office and the Việt Nam National University HCM City (VNU-HCM) have set up a comprehensive communication cooperation under a three-year memorandum of understanding (MoU) signed in HCM City on Tuesday (September 13).

The MoU aims to build a strategic partnership to exploit and promote the strengths of the two sides, and communication cooperation programmes to disseminate the Party and State’s guidelines and policies on developing education, training, science and technology.

It will also enhance cooperation in professional training and consulting activities relating to journalism, communication and marketing.

Every year, the two sides will develop cooperation programmes and plans based on their needs and capacities in line with their functions and tasks.

The VNA’s southern office will create favourable conditions for VNU-HCM to popularise its achievements in training and scientific research on the VNA’s media platforms.

VNU-HCM will support the VNA’s office in terms of academics and experts in fields of mutual interest.

Nguyễn Quốc Tuấn, director of the VNA’s southern representative office, highly appreciated the achievements that the VNU-HCM has secured in the past 27 years of development.

VNU-HCM, one of the top universities in the region and the world, plays an important role in the country's higher education system.

“We are willing to stand side by side with the school to fulfill the political tasks assigned by the Party and State, especially meeting the demand for high quality human resources in the southern region,” he said.

Nguyễn Minh Tâm, deputy director of VNU-HCM, said the two sides will strengthen ties and organise more collaboration activities for mutual development, especially in the field of media training.

“I hope VNA’s southern representative office would create favourable conditions for our students to visit and get internship opportunities at its units,” he said.

As a state-owned agency, the VNA is the official news provider of the Vietnamese Government, with representative offices in all 63 cities and provinces nationwide and 30 overseas bureaus across the five continents.

With more than 60 media products made by more than 1,000 reporters and editors out of the over-2,300-strong staff, the VNA is the press agency with the largest number of information products and forms in the country.

Its source news is in the forms of text, photo, television, infographics and audio to publications such as dailies, weeklies, magazines, pictorials, books, e-newspapers, websites, online and print newspapers, and information on mobile platforms and social networks, among others.

The Prime Minister has approved the “Plan on developing national print newspapers and e-newspapers for foreign service of the VNA” for three news units for foreign service, namely Việt Nam News, Vietnam Pictorial and e-newspaper Vietnamplus.

VNA in the south now has 11 branches for news coverage in provinces and cities from Bình Thuận to Cà Mau, including the southern representative office in HCM City. — VNS