Deputy Prime Minister Trần Hồng Hà had talks with Chairman and General Director of AstraZeneca Việt Nam Nitin Kapoor in Hà Nội on Monday. — VNA/VNS Photo Văn Điệp

HÀ NỘI — It is necessary to strengthen cooperation in vaccines and biopharmaceuticals to proactively prevent and control diseases, Deputy Prime Minister Trần Hồng Hà said while receiving Chairman and General Director of AstraZeneca Việt Nam Nitin Kapoor in Hà Nội on Monday.

The Deputy PM highly appreciated AstraZeneca’s valuable and timely support for Việt Nam in the fight against COVID-19.

He expressed impression for AstraZeneca's ongoing collaboration activities in Việt Nam, particularly in the fields of vaccines and biopharmaceuticals, saying that this plays a crucial role in proactively preparing for potential disease outbreaks in the future.

Việt Nam backs AstraZeneca's commitments to emission reduction and moving towards carbon neutrality in all its activities, Deputy PM Hà said, stressing that experience in COVID-19 prevention and control showed that the world can only push back and end the pandemic if all countries have equal access to vaccines.

Similarly, the goals related to addressing climate change and reducing greenhouse gas emissions could not be achieved if there are countries that stay "outside" these efforts, he said.

Hà emphasised the close relationship between human health and the "health" of the environment, affirming that restoring and protecting the natural environment is a crucial solution to prevent and reduce the burden of disease-related costs on people and society due to the pollution of water, air and waste.

"Technology is a 'vaccine' to address climate change," Hà noted, adding that developing countries like Việt Nam greatly need support and access to various solutions to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

Companies with strong research and development capabilities like AstraZeneca played a crucial role in achieving climate change goals such as cutting emissions to net zero, and engaging in the Just Energy Transition Partnerships (JETP) by joining projects for researching and transferring green fuel production technologies, and developing smart transmission systems and large-scale energy storage devices, he said.

Mentioning AstraZeneca’s project to plant 22.5 million trees, the Deputy PM assigned the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development (MARD) and the Department of Climate Change under the Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment to work closely with AstraZeneca to effectively perform the project.

He expressed his hope that AstraZeneca would engage in projects related to the roadmap for achieving net zero, and JETP in Việt Nam, which serve as experimental and pilot initiatives for global mechanisms.

For his part, Kapoor briefed the Deputy PM on several collaboration programmes and projects currently underway in Việt Nam to strengthen patients’ access to medicines, develop a sustainable healthcare system, improve public health, and conduct clinical trials for drugs and biopharmaceuticals.

AstraZeneca was collaborating with Vietnamese agencies and partners to implement a reforestation and landscape restoration project worth US$50 million, which aims to plant 22.5 million trees over 30,500 ha, thus creating conditions for biodiversity development and providing sustainable livelihoods for more than 17,000 households, Kapoor said.

He noted his hope that the project would serve as a pilot initiative in the action plan of the National Steering Committee for implementing Việt Nam's commitments at the 26th UN Climate Change Conference of the Parties (COP26), therefore encouraging other organisations and businesses to jointly take actions to respond to climate change. — VNS