(VOVworld) – The National Assembly today approved 5 laws: Laws on Deposit Insurance, Law on Anti-money Laundering, Law on Tertiary Education, Law on Prevention of Tobacco's Harmful Effects and Law on Labor Code. The same day, the legislative body discussed the revised Draft Law on Publishing. The deputies agreed that the law itself will create a legal channel to handle current problems while addressing emerging issues in publishing. They also reached a consensus on the importance of enhancing state’s management of this field while at the same time decentralizing power and responsibility. Many deputies said the Ministry of Information and Communication should be in charge of granting the licenses to central printing agencies and organizations with local printing agencies being licenced by provincial people’s committees.

Deputy Tran Thi Dieu Thuy represents Ho Chi Minh City

Deputy Tran Thi Dieu Thuy, who represents Ho Chi Minh City, said: "Regarding the organizational structure of publishing houses, I suggest we keep them as conditional businesses instead of one-member limited companies owned by the government as this brings them no benefit but harms the ideology behind publishing."
Deputy Tran Thi Hong Tham from Can Tho city said: "I propose additional regulations on the state management of publishers and see the introduction of development policies for publications. We should discuss setting up a database to manage every publication in the country, which would be more effective, and not expensive or time-consuming. Just by using a barcode like they use in supermarkets, we can check all the necessary information related to a publication such as the author, publishing house, licence number, and printing agency."
Most deputies agreed on the need to expand the current range of publishing activities, encourage the private sector to get into publishing, and enhance international links in this field. Some deputies suggested getting rid of the article on e-publishing in the draft law to make it more appropriate with global trends and make it easier for publishing houses to compete internationally.