(VOVword) –  The Vietnam-Cuba Inter-governmental Committee started their 31^st meeting in Hanoi on Monday. At the meeting, Construction Minister Trinh Dinh Dung highlighted outstanding cooperation achievements between the two nations over the past two years, especially in the areas of bio-technology and vaccine. Mr. Dung, who is also the Committee’s President, said the Vietnam-Cuba Cooperation Program to promote rice production in Cuba until 2015 has brought about encouraging results and has helped to recently minimize rice imports and gradually ensure food security.

At the meeting, both sides reviewed the implementation of the minutes of the previous meeting, and examined potential areas of cooperation in the mid-term economic cooperation programme, as defined in a memorandum of understanding signed by the two governments in Hanoi in August. Delegates also worked out solutions to shortcomings to improve the efficiency of bilateral cooperation and set future directions for this and next year.