Secretary of Can Tho Municipal Party Committee Received Israeli Ambassador

On March 07^th, 2018, Secretary of Can Tho Municipal Party Committee – Mr. Tran Quoc Trung hosted a reception for H.E. Nadav Eshcar, Israeli Ambassador to Vietnam on the occasion of his working visit to Can Tho city.

Secretary Tran Quoc Trung presented a souvenir to H.E. Ambassador Nadav Eshcar at the reception. (Photo: Minh Trang)

At the reception, Mr. Trung shared his impressions on Israel and its people during his first trip there. He emphasized how much he was amazed by the small country with almost no natural resources and harsh climatic conditions but Israel has coped with everything thanks to its application of advanced technologies into production activities, especially in high-tech agriculture and aquaculture.

Mr. Trung continued providing an overview of the cooperation between Can Tho city and Israel. So far the city have cooperated with Israel in a number of fields via frequent visits, technology transfer in agriculture and aquaculture, education and trade. However, the gained outcomes are still humble in comparison to potentials of  both sides. For example, Can Tho city's export turnovers to Israel in 2017 were at $1.3 millions with no records of the reverse.  

Mr. Trung, therefore, stressed his expectations in further promoting deepening such relationship in the mentioned fields and expanding to others. Cultural exchanges, environment and post-harvest technologies were among new sectors for cooperation possibilities.

In following Mr. Trung's speech, Mr. Truong Quang Hoai Nam – Vice Chairman of the People's Committee, briefed the good outcomes achieved in Can Tho's aquaculture field in producing all-male tiger shrimps by Israeli technologies provided by Tiran Shipping Corporation. Additionally, Mr. Nam suggested that for future cooperation activities, there should be demonstration models using Israeli advancements in science and technology to convince Can Tho's citizens in application of new technologies into production activities.

In response, H.E. Ambassador expressed his happiness towards the city's needs for further cooperation in the future with Israel. He agreed with both leaders' recommendations on the cooperation possibilities by suggesting Can Tho's participation in the agritech event organized in Israel in May 2018, co-organization of an exhibition about Albert Einstein's life and work in Can Tho city later this year to celebrate the 25^th anniversary of the establishment of the diplomatic relations between Vietnam and Israel, and support in networking with Vietnamese Ministry of Education and Training to make proposals for including 2 Israeli universities (among 100 top universities in the world) into a recommended list for Vietnamese students' study abroad choices.

In terms of science and technology transfer via demonstration models, H.E. Ambassador supported the idea and requested for detailed plans by the city to describe what need to be done and how to carry out these models. He requested Can Tho city's contact points to liaise with the Economic Section of the Embassy of Israel in Hanoi for cooperation activities in the future.