Hello and welcome to the weekly Letter Box on the Voice of Vietnam. We are… very glad to be back in this segment reading your letters.

A: This week, we are very impressed with a letter from Alan Roe, a listener from Teddington, Middlesex in the UK. Alan has been a listener of English Program on the Voice of Vietnam, since the 1970s. It has been so long that he no longer remembers the exact date that he first heard VOV and that last time he wrote to us was a couple of years ago. Welcome back to VOV, Alan.

B: Alan wrote: “I’m very much enjoying your new Monday program “Colorful Vietnam- Vietnam’s 54 Ethnic Groups”. It is proving to be a fascinating series and very informative. When I first saw the program title mentioned, before the first edition aired, I assumed that the program was going to be only about the minority ethnic groups, and was slightly surprised that you started with the majority ethnic group. Actually, in retrospect, that makes perfect sense. However, I do look forward to hearing about the other 53 ethnic groups as time goes by”.

Quan Ho folk duets in Bac Ninh province- a UNESCO Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity.

A: Thank you very much Alan for your kind words. Many other listeners also share the same view with you about this segment. Please keep tuning into VOV to hear more about Vietnamese ethnic groups and diverse culture of Vietnam. Alan, we are happy to know that you also enjoy our Saturday Report, Weekend Music and the Sunday Show while not forgetting the Letter Box Program. Thanks for the pledge to write more regularly in the future.

B: And we are most impressed with your short review of our station in the North American Shortwave Association’s NASWA Journal Magazine in May, 2013 The review is proof that you listen to our programs regularly and attentively and that you are very interested in VOV program. Thank you very much for promoting our station and encouraging other shortwave listeners to tune into VOV. Each day we try to make our programs more and more interesting for our listeners around the world. Alan, we will send you a QSL to confirm your reception report. Once again, thank you.

A: This week, we received an email from Ishtar Baltasar who is interested in investment and investment procedures in Vietnam.  Viet Nam witnessed a surge in newly registered and additional FDI in the first five months of this year. Totaling US$8.5 billion, the amount was an increase of 8.9 per cent over that of the same period last year. The country licensed 398 foreign-invested projects with newly-registered cap.

B: According to the Ministry of Planning and Investment's Foreign Investment Agency, the processing and manufacturing industries still top the list of the 18 sectors that received foreign investment. They are seeing new and additional capital of $7.5 billion, followed by the property, wholesale and retail sectors.

A: According to the agency, among the 40 countries and territories that have invested in Viet Nam, Japan ranked first with newly-registered and additional capital of $3.6 billion in the reviewed period, followed by Singapore with $2.3 billion and Russia with $1 billion.

B: Central Thanh Hoa Province led other localities in FDI attraction with $2.8 billion in the aforementioned time. Northern Thai Nguyen came second with over $2 billion and central Binh Dinh Province, third with more than $1 billion.

Thang Long Industrial Park in Hanoi

A: You have just listened to an update overview of Vietnam’s foreign investment. With regards to your question about investment procedures in Vietnam, it depends on the locality and the sector that you want to invest in. For general information, you can check out the website http://fia.mpi.gov.vn of the Ministry of Planning and Investment or http://vietnam.eregulations.org/, where you can find necessary and detailed guidelines for investment procedures in Vietnam.

B: We hope to see you soon in Vietnam. Every week, our office is flooded with letters from Fumito Hokamura of Japan. We are delighted to read his letters and reception reports. The content of his letters help us make our program more interesting to our foreign listeners.

A: This week, in addition to reception reports on the programs on 12020 MHz on May 14 with Sinpo rated at 54433 and May 18 with SINPO rated at 45333, Fumito has a question about Jewish living in Vietnam.

B: Jews are a minor ethnic and religious group in Vietnam, presently consisting of only about 300 people, which amounts to an extremely small percentage of Vietnam’s population. Although Jews have been present in Vietnam and Judaism has been practiced since the 19th century, most adherents have been, and remain today, expatriates, with few or no native Vietnamese converts.

A: The first Jews to visit Vietnam likely arrived following the French colonization of the country in the latter half of the 19th century. There are a handful of references to Jewish settlement in Ho Chi Minh City sprinkled through the pages of the Jewish Chronicle in the 1860s and 1870s.

A: With these lots of information about the Jewish community in Vietnam, we hope that we have answered your question, Fumito. This week, we would like to say hello to Abdulkarim Ahmed Ali of Libya, who sent us his “cordial greetings perfumed with spring flowers fragrance”, and a reception report for the program on February 15, on the frequency of 5955 KHz with SINPO being rated at all 4s.

A: From Bangladesh, Sumanto Kumar says he has resumed listening to VOV regularly after his exam. Sumanto, I hope your exam was successful and we will send you a program guide to ensure that you listen to VOV properly.

B: Jorg Clements Hoffmann from Germany wrote: “First of all I like to thank you so much for verifying my report back in March this year with your beautiful QSL card and post card. I especially enjoyed the report about the ethnic groups in your country, but listening to the news and comment was of great interest as well. So it is good, that the Voice of Vietnam is still broadcasting on Shortwave to spread the word about your country”.

A: Jorg also sent us a reception report on the program on June 18, on 6175 Khz, SINPO 44433 with some fading. Thank you Jorg and a VOV QSL card is on the way.

B: This week, we would like to thank Siddhartha Bhattachajee from India, Rafiqul Islam from Bangladesh, Mizanur Rahman of Bangladesh, Nicos Agapiades of Greece, Fauisal Ahmed from Bangladesh, Sharma from India, Stephen Mason from, USA and Li Ming from China. We greatly appreciate your feedback and comment on our program. Dear listeners, your reception reports were all complete enough for us to send you letters of confirmation. If your name wasn’t mentioned this week, don’t feel left out. We’ll try to mention you next time.

A: Well, time is up for this week’s Letter Box. Before we go, we’d like to remind you of our address:

The English program,

Overseas Service, Radio Voice of Vietnam,

45 Ba Trieu Street, Hanoi, Vietnam

B: Or you can email us at: englishsection@vov.org.vn. If you miss any of our programs, you can always catch up by logging onto our website at: www.vovworld.vn, where you can hear both live broadcasts and previously recorded programs. Good bye