Engineer Nguyễn Văn Tuân at work. — VNA/VNS Photo Minh Thu

HẢI PHÒNG — With the initiative "Reducing the density of conductive cores, reducing the cost of electric cable production", engineer Nguyễn Văn Tuân has been honoured as a typical individual in the One Million Initiatives Programme by the Việt Nam General Confederation of Labour.

He was awarded the Creative Labour Degree 2022.

His initiative also won first prize in the Science and Technology Innovation Contest organised by the Hải Phòng Labour Federation last year.

Tuân is deputy head of the Electric Cable Production Division under the LS VINA Cable and System Joint Stock Company.

His initiative was applied from the beginning of 2021.

It benefited the company VNĐ38.7 billion (US$1.5 million) in 2021 and over VNĐ40 billion ($1.6 million) last year.

Tuân, 39, was born in Hải Đường Commune, Hải Hậu District in the northern province of Nam Định.

When he was in school, he loved mechanical engineering.

He registered for the Thái Nguyên University of Industrial Technology, the only school that specialised in the major at that time.

After five years of studying, to facilitate family activities, he chose Hải Phòng northern port city as a place to live.

In 2009, he applied for the LS VINA Cable and System Joint Stock Company and worked in the Maintenance Division, then transferred to the Production Division.

During his work, he witnessed the company's development stemming from its technical improvement campaign.

He himself also had many initiatives such as changing the braid mould structure for bare cables; improving protective oil supply equipment on bare cable surfaces; and improving the waterproofing powder filling machine for partial cores.

In 2018, the company assigned him to visit the Korean LSCNS Group and a number of other companies to find solutions for reducing lead core costs.

After studying, combined with the knowledge and experience gained during his work, he began to research and experiment.

After more than one year, he completed the research and reported his initiative to the company to put it into production.

The initiative’s effectiveness was clear, but when it was applied the change drew reactions from workers.

Being used to operating familiar technical tools, but now switching to a new method, everyone found it difficult, especially the first few times, as twisting the cable was much more difficult than with the old method.

To handle this problem, Tuân accompanied the workers and continued to improve techniques, and finally succeeded, helping to reduce production materials by one or two per cent and improving product quality.

His work was highly appreciated by customers and workers can now do the work more conveniently.

Bùi Văn Tiến, a worker of the Electric Cable Production Division, said that at first, applying the initiative faced obstacles due to the high friction of the hardened core, and this method was different from the previous use of rollers for compression.

But then Tuân improved the method.

After two to three times implementing the new process, workers got used to it, and now work more leisurely and with greater efficiency.

“Most valuable is the feeling of completing the task”

Tuân said that the greatest happiness when research results became reality was the feeling of completing the task.

Talking about Tuân’s initiative, Đỗ Hoàng Tháp, chairman of the company’s Trade Union, said that the initiative continuously brought benefits to the company.

From Tuân’s and other engineers’ work, the company's product quality is increasingly improved, raising competitiveness in the market, thereby creating jobs and pushing up workers’ income.

​Tháp said that the company's success was due to many factors, including the emulation campaign "Good workers, creative workers" implemented by the company's Trade Union.

The campaign was effective through programmes such as saving and reducing costs, enhancing high labour productivity, one person works as much as two.

The programmes have promoted the creativity and research capacity of workers, thereby finding good solutions and new ways of doing things to bring efficiency, typically reducing costs.

In the campaign, Tuân and other engineers researched, improved and successfully manufactured cable conductive core structures with high electricity transmission efficiency, reducing the weight of raw materials by five per cent.

“Recognising and honouring initiatives will multiply the fire of passion and is the motivation for each individual to actively strive,” said Tháp.

In addition to economic benefits, initiatives also bring many social benefits such as reducing labour, increasing the life of machinery and equipment, saving fuel, and limiting waste released into the environment, he said. — VNS