 sharkwch.��a hwnnw iddynt hefyd. Fe hallwch! Mae'r edrychi niech yn cael ei hyn o'r ffordd. Mae Llywodraeth sio'r ffordd. Mae Llywodraeth. Mae Llywodraeth sio'r ffordd. Mae'r wych! Mae'r wych yn cael ei wneud hynny. Mae'n gweithio gyda ni'n cael eu cynnwys eu cyfnodol. Mae gennym yn cael ei weld, arall, fyddwch. Mae'n gweithio gyda ni'n gweithio gyda ni. Mae fyddynau'r ffordd. Mae'r pwysbydd â'u cyfnodol yn Rhywbeth, felly rydyn ni'n dweud o'n ddweud o'r llwyffydd o'r llwyffydd, a'r unedig o'r unedig o Oxford a Harvard. Rydyn ni'n gweithio'r Fietnwmiol ym Mhoryn Fawr yn 1999, ac yw'r ddweud o'r ddweud o'r ddweudio'r Fietnwmiol ym Mhoryn Fawr yn ymgyrchol a'r agri-cultr o'r ddweudio'r ddweudio. Mae'r ddweudio ymgyrchol ymgyrchol yn y ddweud o'r ddweud o'r ffaith o'r ymgyrchol, sy'n mynd i fyistedyn o'r relai i'r rhiwelfyddau amgyrchol ym Mhoryn Fawr yn ymgyrchol a'r ymgyrchol yn y ffaith o'r ymgyrchol a'r arweithio'r parw Societyf Montyn Cll agon Yn nid! Ac mis fydd yn iawn i'r rhaglen i'ch credu ymateb a'r ddweudio'r ymgyrchol a'r ymgyrchol i'r credu. Dwi'n yn cael ei rôl yw. Adonai'n bryd i chi am ymgyrchol. Mae'r gwaith o'r Llywodraeth yn staff ni'n gwneud o'r Fietnau. is Vietnamese. Fantastic. Now because I always delighted to immerse myself and speak with young people because young people have a fresh mind about Vietnam. Vietnam is often linked to a war ac mae'n gwybod dod wedi'u llyfr. Mae'n mynd i ddechrau dweud y ddechrau ddechrau ddechrau byd. Mae'n dweud y ddechrau ddechrau ddechrau ddechrau a'r cyfnod ddechrau a'r cyfnod ddechrau ddechrau ddechrau ddechrau. And not make people think about Vietnam of today. And maybe because sometimes people try to like forget that terrible time and forget that name and forget that country, too. If I forget that name and forget that country tune with the UK Vietnam has two things that is that's not happy Vietnam to be linked with the UK. First of all, we are not a former colony of the British Empire. the UK has never been involved in the Vietnamese war. But that's why the story of Vietnam and the name of Vietnam is not familiar with many of the UK public. So I take this opportunity to express my sincere thanks to the school for inviting me to be here today and to share some information about my country gyfnodd Brytyn, gyfnodd Abertaeth Uned, ac rydyn ni wedi portio gyrraedd ar y bydd y gyrraedd I will find Vietnam and you will work with Vietnam interested in Vietnam and then to bring Vietnam and UK closer together. So I just told Professor about my first experience with SAS. I was a student, I was in Milan University of Bokoni. At that time it's very trendy for European students around Europe to get to the London to have a summer course of English to enjoy London and the UK during summer. So I came here in summer 1994. Many of you were not born yet at that time I think. And young, you know, innocent guy just came and discover London and some of my friends studying here in SAS and they say, Let's come to SAS. It's where we have a lot of Asian friends. We can enjoy that because they organize also some of the activity events here. And that's why I came to SAS. And it was very, you know, surprised by the environment of this school. I have to say that I'm very much interested in doing later on an exchange that time they called Erasmus with the UK. So I want to start with presenting to you about my country. So Vietnam today is a country is located in Southeast Asia. I think we stay in the Brunei building and think so we are in the same area, Southeast Asian region. And we border with China in the north clouds in the north west and with Cambodia in the southwest. We are around 330 square kilometers, 30,000 square kilometers, more or less like the UK. But we have a population of around 100 million. And the characteristic of this population is that it's a very young population. I think 6% of the population is under age of 14. So you would go to Vietnam and see a lot of young people around. And it's a vibrant, very dynamic society. And in full economic development this year, we will have an economic growth rate of around 8%. And I think we will achieve later next year around 6%. And this is our average growth rate for the last decade is 6.5%. So it means it's a very prosperous and fast growing economy. But of course we started as a very low level income country. Because the war because many reasons. A country was up to the war went through a very difficult period until the end of the 80s of the last century. And then we decided to undertake the reform process, the opening process, the so-called integration process of Vietnam that take the country into the economic and growth path since the beginning of the 1990s. And that from a country, a poverty, a country devastated and wounded by the war Vietnam gradually becoming a middle income country. A country with social economic stability. And a destination for investment for tourism. And for people to people link. Now when we talk about Vietnam, talk about country stability, a piece of development of young generation. That is thriving and hard working to bring the country forward. So it's no more a name of the war. And that is good. And first and foremost, the relationship with the US from being enemies in the past. Vietnam and the US now are becoming closest partners in many fields. And that is also the incredible results of this opening path of this integration path and this reconciliation path. Together with the economic development, we have established and developed a lot of diplomatic relations with the world. So next year in 2023, Vietnam and the UK will celebrate 50 years of diplomatic relations. And as ambassador to the UK, I will have a lot of activities to celebrate that to remember that. Particularly with the control activities, education activities, art, exhibition, music, dance, many activities will be organized not only in London, but also around the country, the four nations. So talking about Vietnam UK relationship, I have to say that we did not have a lot of cooperation since the beginning of 2000. Very little. As I say, Vietnam is not a former colony. We do not have a historical traditional relationship. And that's why we do not have such cooperation. But at the beginning of 2000, when we have a shift in the foreign policy of the UK government, I think I remember that time is the Labour government under Tony Blair. We adopted a very active engagement policy towards Vietnam, particularly in the field of development cooperation. So the UK have massively implemented in Vietnam an ODA program and have been Vietnam in three main areas. The poverty eradication in social and minority community development and in education. And that marks the change in the foreign policy of the UK government towards Vietnam beginning of 2000. And since then, the relationship between the two countries has been developed from strength to strength and responding to many areas. And I have to say that now when I am here together with you in this particular moment, the relationship between two countries is the best ever before. So I think we want to talk about UK relationship because I would like to give you the interest to study about Vietnam. We established in 2010 a framework of collaboration that called strategic partnership framework where we outlined the five priority sectors of collaboration. The first is in the field of political diplomacy, second is trade investment, third is education, fourth is defence security and the fifth is people to people link. And I have to say that in these five areas, we have done a lot of achievements. And for example, in the field of economic and trade and business from nearly nothing in bilateral trade, this year we have achieved nearly 7 billion US dollars of bilateral trade. And Vietnam is becoming the second largest trading partner of the UK in Southeast Asia. But if you think about the first partner of the UK is Singapore and Singapore is not a market, Singapore is an intermediary. So if you talk about market, Vietnam is the first trading market for the UK. That explains the vibrant trade and business relationship between the UK and Vietnam for the last 20 years. The trade volume ever growth rate of around 10% every year from 10% to 15% every year is incredible. And we have the future is much, much better because the two countries have signed the free trade agreement after Britain. And the UK now is soon to join the CPTPP, which means a free trade agreement in the Asia Pacific region with 11 other 11 members including Vietnam. And that will open a much, much more larger market for UK businesses in the region including Vietnam. And that's why I think for the next five or 10 years, the UK will be more and more deeply engaged and involved in the area and Vietnam UK trade relationship will flourish. I'm very optimistic about the trade volume. It will be double for the next five years. I'm sure about that. We'll soon reach 10 billion in bilateral trade and even more. But trade in good is not everything. We have another aspect. It's very important is trading services. You know that UK is powerhouse of the net services. So in Vietnam, the biggest two foreign banks and the first two foreign banks were given license to be established locally in Vietnam with HSBC and standard shadow bank. The first foreign insurance company was given license back in 2008 was Prudential, for example. So in Vietnam, the UK is very much present with financial services. Another services sector is forishing between Vietnam and the UK is a higher education. So the UK is for years, since 20 years now, since that shit the policy that the UK is number one partner Vietnam in high education. The number of Vietnamese students starting in the UK pre pandemic level is around 15,000. More than the US, more than Australia, more than any other European countries. Between the universities of the two countries, we have nearly 100 partnerships. And the biggest partner of high education of Vietnam is the University of London. That's why we have a very close relationship in the University of London and also South. And that is, I think, very important because investing education is investing in the future, investing in quality, investing in everything. And the UK has the top quality to offer to Vietnam. I think this sector is the most important thing. The most important sector of collaboration between Vietnam and the UK, education, education and education. And now, not only in high education, the UK is number one for Vietnam in two other areas. First is English teaching. In Vietnam, in the past, we were the colony of France. So it used to be a phangophone country. Generation like my father, they speak French. But now in Vietnam, the young people, I think 97 young people, they speak English. So I think, and English teaching system is very important. We have the British Council is very much present in Vietnam. I think the biggest English teaching centre of British Council in the region is based in Ho Chi Minh City. And they have a very enormous program to widen and deepen that program with Vietnamese partners, because they want to teach English within elementary, within kindergarten, within television and many things. So I think the program is enormous. And then another sector that is very important. And here again, UK is our talk partner is the assessment, quality assessment. So by quality assessment, I'm not talking only about university, but assessment about all schools, every schools at all level in Vietnam. And this is particularly important because we want to raise the level of our education system as a whole system. And we need third party, good third party to help us to assess and to raise this quality. And again, the UK is our talk partner. In defence, I mean, actually, is, you know that recently the, the HMS Elizabeth, the, the strike, a strike career group has made the maiden trip to the area to Southeast Asia. And they plan to come back to the area by 2024. I met with Secretary of State Ben Wallace two days ago. And this is another sign of the, of the military cooperation, military engagement of Britain. And it's also very important, the presence and the, and the collaboration in the field of defence and security by people to people link. I want to mention about the collaboration between local governments. It's very important. Nowadays, even in the UK, for example, in the field of education of culture, social services, many of the competence rely on local governments and also in Vietnam. And we have this very strong collaboration with the devolved administration. Now, for example, in the Wales, particularly in education and business, of course. And also for now it was Scotland in renewables Scotland now is becoming the centre of the world for renewables, for example. I'm thinking of about some of the initiative with Northern Ireland for the next year or so. Because we think people to people link is very important friendship between the two countries lie with them, stay with them. You have this strong collaboration, strong relationship, strong people to people link, you have the good foundation of friendship among the two countries. And only based on a good friendship between the two countries, you can have sexual development of relationship, as I said before. Because at the end of the day, relationship between the country, any country in the world has to be friendship. It's not because you have to go there to make profit, to make money or to make friendship among people around the world. And you feel happy about that. When you study about Vietnam, you need to be happy about studying Vietnam and not because you have to, all right. So I think another aspect that I would like to raise with you is if you come to Vietnam, you'll find a hospital, a friendly country. I think people Vietnam is the most friendliest people in the world. And you can feel that when you come to Vietnam. I used to, when I was in Italy, I was ambassador to Vietnam to Italy in 2012, 2015. I always told my Italian friends that if you go to Asia and you will see Vietnam as the most Western European style of country in Asia. And that's true, that's true. We are very open country, not religious based. So we are, and we eat, we dress, we think, we enjoy, we entertain. Everything is like in Europe. And the society is open and vibrant. If you said safety is number one element in our society. And I think it's very important that you feel attracted to the country and then you will study them. I have met when I came here a year ago. They have met several politicians, ministers, MPs and professors. And a lot of them told me, ambassador, I was in Vietnam years ago. I was very young, but I was a tourist and I loved the country. I think this is my experience a young student during that trip in Vietnam really helped me to understand your country and your people. So my message today is I hope you will, in your study path, will find Vietnam interesting. And you will find, you will come to Vietnam and visit Vietnam. I think now with the tourist scheme, we are working towards bringing a lot more British students to come to Vietnam. And I hope that understanding Vietnam would also contribute to your career and to also to contribute to develop Vietnam, your co-relationship. And I think that will be a very interesting path forward. Vietnam is like a country that you, how can you say, you will find appetite when you discover that. This is a process, it's a path. So the message normally, the message of my friend in the tourism sector is, what is the charming? It's a hidden charm. Vietnam is a hidden charm, that is. So you need to discover this message. So I stay here for your question. Thank you. Well, thank you very much. That's fascinating. That's one of the few people present who remembers the Vietnam War, reading about it, certainly. It's fascinating to hear how things have changed and moved on. And one of the things in history is you can sort of, you read about something and you think that that's it, it's full stop. And you don't always follow on what happens from there. So thank you for that. May I start the question by perhaps asking you the sort of question that is slightly awkward. What we read quite a lot about Chinese activities in the South China Sea. And I just wondered what the Vietnam perspective was on that, on the problems that are happening there. Yeah. Well, actually, I don't know if you are familiar with the South China Sea issue. But we have in the South China Sea, there are territorial sovereignty claims by different countries and parties. China, Taiwan, Vietnam, Philippines, Brunei, Malaysia. And now, under some aspect, also Indonesia. And in the past, countries tend to keep the differences under control and that contributed the stability of the region. You know that through the South China Sea maritime routes is 60% of total trade volume between Europe and Asia Pacific. So that is very important maritime trade routes. And keeping the region stable and peaceful is interest of everybody. But then we have, I think, a country had adopted and change the policy towards a more assertive and more aggressive policy. Because the country is big, because the country is very strong. And that's why not only Vietnam, not regional countries, but also the international community have stand up and say you have to abide by international law. You have to uphold international law. You have to play by the rules. We need to respect the so-called rules based international order. And I think this is the common ground of many countries, including UK. So I think what we need to do is first, we need to resolve differences through peaceful meanings, dialogue, and not through threat of use of force, a bullying, others. And this is what we stand for. And also UK as a member, a responsible member, an important member of the international community also has this position. Thank you very much. Questions, please. Sir. I was going to ask, is Ho Chi Minh City the most popular tourist destination? How much revenue is made every year? No, Ho Chi Minh is the biggest city in Vietnam is the economic engine of Vietnamese economy. Meanwhile, Hanoi is more a political centre, but also very important economic centre. But Ho Chi Minh is always known as the powerhouse of economic development. So if the GDP of Vietnam is around $400 billion last year, it makes the Ho Chi Minh City account for around 30%. So that is more or less the number. It's very important centre, but it's not only the centre for economic development, but it's where we have a very vibrant community of experts. A lot of foreigners, they want to stay there, investors, foreign investors, a lot of British investors, they want to stay there. Now with the problem in Hong Kong, a lot of people in Hong Kong now is moving to Ho Chi Minh City and not Singapore. Because Ho Chi Minh is a lot of room to develop. You should have the potential to grow. That's why a lot of people are coming and a lot of British people. I have a lot of people, my British friends live in Ho Chi Minh City and they're very happy about that. I think we've got time for one more question. Sir. I was wondering because the relationship between UK and Vietnam is strongly based on the administration. For example, that was the beginning of three post-historations in the 2000s. I was wondering if the UK is changing the Prime Minister quite a few times this year and in the last year. Has that affected the relationship with Vietnam in a sense and especially in the national conspiracy part of the relationship? Very good question. And normally students are very interested in knowing and even us, like diplomats. The first thing you see when you change government, you see how you change the foreign policy. Because the Prime Minister has his own views, his own evaluation and judgment about things in the world. So, of course, we follow very closely the new governments and the new administration, the new ministers on a specific field of collaboration. So, for example, now we have a very good relationship in security, it depends. And we see Ben Wallace as a Secretary of State there and we have a very good relationship. And of course, if the change, we need to know how it will be affected the Vietnam-UK relationship in this field. We have a very good relationship with the administration of Boris Johnson, particularly in the field of climate change. So, if the new government is changing their views on climate change, our force will affect the relationship with Vietnam and so on and so forth. And actually it's a good question. So, but the general overall feeling, I am sure that is the positive development between the two countries is there, the path is there. And the UK is very committed to Indo-Pacific. We have the global Britain strategy, the tilt in the Pacific. They are committed. Any new government, a new prime minister, a new foreign secretaries always confirmed that there's no change. So the UK will commit the resources, the efforts, the time to the region. And that is, and of course, this also a very, I think, big argument of Brexit, right? Because people and many politicians, the Brexit tears always say that that is the future, that is the market, that is where we have to go. And then of course it's true because when you see trade relationship increased by 10, 15%, the economic wealth of many countries in that region, you see India, for example, or it's Vietnam. It's astonishing. It's completely changed every five to 10 years. And you put the money, $1 in Vietnam, you have $5, $10 within one year, for example, and not like a small step. I think it's also a bad, because when you think it's different about when you do, from thinking to doing, it also depends on your own capabilities. For example, for business, for example, in the past, many businesses, particularly the small and medium-sized companies, they used to work with the European market. It's very close to you, close to contract, close to geography, close to distant, close to system, close to many things. So you just be a little bit lazy working with the European market. But when you work with the Asia Pacific market, you have to travel, you have to think, you have to know, you have to study again. And you cannot be lazy. It's a competitive market. It's here. If you want to warn the economic competition, you need to be good at that. You have to try to that and not staying like, okay, it's different approaches. But I think with your young generation, like you are here and equal to study and equal to be competitive. And Sawaas will give you this competitiveness. I'm sure that with Vietnam you will be successful. Ambassador, thank you very much indeed. We need to call it a halt there, but thank you very much indeed.