Latest news with #Phuc
Korea Herald
21-07-2025
- Business
- Korea Herald
DA NANG GLOBAL BUSINESS SUMMIT 2025: DA NANG NEW AREA: TECHNOLOGY-DRIVEN GROWTH ACROSS INDUSTRIES
, July 21, 2025 /PRNewswire/ -- On August 12, 2025, the Da Nang Global Business Summit 2025 will officially take place at Wink Icon Danang Riverside, Da Nang city. The event will bring together over 50 experts, leaders, and senior executives from various sectors, including technology, hospitality, real estate, logistics, and tourism. Under the theme "Da Nang New Era: Technology-Driven Growth Across Industries," the summit promises to deliver strategic perspectives on the role of technology and cross-sector collaboration in driving sustainable business growth and shaping Da Nang's future development. The summit takes place at a pivotal time, as Da Nang undergoes major strategic shifts in its development direction, most notably, the proposed administrative merger with Quang Nam province. With its geographic advantages, infrastructure, human resources, and innovative policies, Da Nang is poised to emerge as a new growth engine for Vietnam, targeting its transformation into a large-scale, highly competitive economic and urban center in the Asia-Pacific region. In the future, Da Nang is set to become a national hub for innovation, high technology, and start-ups, gradually building a modern, smart urban ecosystem that will elevate its status and Vietnam's on the global stage. Accompanying this transformative phase, the Da Nang Global Business Summit 2025 is designed to serve as a multidimensional platform connecting business leaders, investors, and international experts. Together, they will explore cutting-edge technologies, sustainable development solutions, and cross-sector collaboration opportunities – critical drivers of Da Nang's advancement into a dynamic global economic hub. During the summit, attendees will gain valuable insights into emerging technology trends and international market expansion strategies from respected regional experts: Da Nang Global Business Summit 2025 is also a platform to unlock new investment and growth opportunities while fostering strategic partnerships between domestic and international businesses. As a result, enterprises can proactively seize opportunities, leverage local strengths, and lead in innovation, boosting their presence and accelerating growth in Da Nang, Vietnam's future economic powerhouse. At a time when Vietnam is emerging as a strategic node in the global semiconductor and AI value chains, our special guest, Mr. Phuc from Da Nang Semiconductor & AI Center will deliver a forward-looking presentation on Da Nang's transformation into a high-tech innovation and investment hub. With confidence in the city's future, Mr. Phuc sees this platform as a catalyst for real progress, where global partners can truly recognize the full potential of the New Da Nang Economy. His session will provide valuable insights into why now is the ideal time for international companies to invest, expand, and build in Da Nang. "This exclusive summit brings together 100 C-level decision-makers from across industries and countries to explore high-impact collaboration opportunities in Da Nang, Vietnam. With strong support from our strategic partners, our vision is to expand this series across Southeast Asia — with each edition focusing on a high-potential industry — creating a platform for meaningful business exchange and sustainable growth in both Da Nang and the region." said Ms. Thuy, Founder of the Da Nang Global Business Summit. Da Nang Global Business Summit 2025 is an initiative by Lion Huynh Tran Co., Ltd., held in collaboration with strategic partners, including Wink Hotels, Sky36, InCorp Vietnam, Cellier Indochine, La La Land, PR Newswire, Omega Digital, Omega Render, and The Marketing House Vietnam. The event aims to establish an annual platform for economic dialogue, opening development opportunities for the business community and accompanying Da Nang on its journey to becoming a leading destination for investment and innovation in the region.
Al Jazeera
28-02-2025
- Business
- Al Jazeera
‘Business is not good': Vietnam's floating markets dwindle as economy soars
Can Tho, Vietnam – As dawn breaks over Can Tho, the city's river is filled with the roaring engines of tour boats. In the distance, traditional wooden houseboats emerge through the dim light as the Cai Rang Floating Market comes into view. Cai Rang, and other markets like it, were once among the most recognisable cultural icons of southern Vietnam, with a history dating back to the early 20th Century. Before the development of roads and bridges, the myriad waterways of the delta region were the primary means of trade and transport, leading to the development of floating markets where channels converged. But over the last two decades, the markets have dwindled in size in tandem with Vietnam's rapid economic development – first gradually, then suddenly – and only two of the region's 10 major markets retain any significant presence. 'When I first visited [Cai Rang] market in 2011, it was much larger,' Linh, a local guide, told Al Jazeera. 'Now it's about a third of that size,' said Linh, who led daily tours to the market up until a few years ago. Today, Cai Rang comprises about 200 vessels, fewer than half as many as during its peak in the 1990s. Nearby Phong Dien market has shrunk to fewer than a dozen boats and has largely disappeared from tourist itineraries. Cai Be, a once-thriving market in neighbouring Ben Tre province, is among those that have vanished completely, closing for good in 2021. Historically the biggest of the delta's markets, Cai Rang still resembles a decent-sized assembly of boats – at least from afar. On closer inspection, the market looks more sparse. Nowadays, tour boats make up a significant portion of the traffic on the water. Still, the market functions much as it always has, as sampans are loaded up with produce from larger 'wholesalers', which is then brought back to markets on land. For many sellers, the boats double as homes. Daily life is on full display as the boat dwellers wash dishes with water from the river, cook meals over small stoves, or relax in hammocks – often with children and pet dogs in tow. Yet behind the photogenic charm, anxieties linger. 'Business is not good,' Phuc, who works at the market selling pineapples to tourists, told Al Jazeera. Sometimes she sells just 10 pineapples a day at 20,000 Vietnamese dong ($0.78) each. 'Only in the high season is it possible to make enough money. The rest of the time, we are barely surviving.' Until two years ago, Phuc and her husband worked as wholesalers selling yams. Every week for the previous 25 years, they would travel to Long An province, near Ho Chi Minh City, to restock their boat – a process that took several days there and back. But as road infrastructure has improved in the last decade, land-based trade has become faster and more cost-effective, supplanting the need for river-based commerce. 'The only people who continue to work here are those who can't afford to buy a van or a big car [to deliver produce],' her husband, Thanh, told Al Jazeera. Tuyen, who works as a wholesaler selling onions, garlic and sweet potatoes, is also downbeat. 'Ten years ago, I used to earn good money doing this, but now it's just enough to get by,' she told Al Jazeera, while preparing a breakfast of fish soup on her boat. 'Everything is more difficult now.' Tuyen said the COVID-19 pandemic was a turning point, after which many sellers, unable to make ends meet, switched to working on land. Asked why she did not join them, she pointed to the rental fees for a market spot – about five million Vietnamese dong ($195). On the boat, she has no rent to pay. 'I'd prefer to stay on land – it's more comfortable and convenient – but I don't have the money,' she said. While improved roads are often cited as the reason for the markets' decline, other factors have played a part. Many smaller markets have struggled to recover from temporary closures during the pandemic, as health and safety regulations prompted a shift to land-based markets. Poor planning has further exacerbated the situation. To address the annual flooding of the Mekong Delta, the authorities have in recent years constructed flood prevention walls along the banks of the Can Tho river, one of its many waterways. While these walls have helped reduce flooding and erosion, the absence of piers has made it harder for river-based trade to continue. Broader cultural shifts also cast a cloud over the future of the floating market. As Vietnam modernises, younger generations are turning their backs on their parents' trade, seeking better education and career opportunities. 'My daughter doesn't want to work here,' Phuc said. 'She prefers to work on her own terms for a company and invest in stocks. She's not like us – she doesn't like this life.' Though vendors may worry about the future, Cai Rang's survival appears to be of little consequence to the average resident of the nearby city of Can Tho. These days, most people shop in supermarkets and shopping malls and have little reason to visit Cai Rang. 'For me, it's nothing special,' a hotel receptionist, who has visited the market only once, told Al Jazeera, asking not to be named. Yet tourism contributes approximately 6 percent to the city's economy, with Cai Rang Floating Market the main draw. In 2017, the city welcomed 7.5 million tourists, according to official figures. While arrivals hit 5.9 million in 2023 after dropping off to practically nothing during the pandemic, the numbers remain significantly below their peak. Much of this is due to the consequences of the pandemic and a reduced number of flights from other parts of Vietnam, according to Son Ca Huynh, who runs a tour company in Can Tho. If the floating market should close, efforts to revive tourism are likely to become harder still. Huynh, who is branching out into cooking classes and off-the-beaten-track canal boat tours, said efforts to preserve the market could focus on its appeal to tourists, citing the floating markets of Bangkok as an example, rather than its commercial function. 'At the Bangkok markets, they sell many different things,' Huynh told Al Jazeera. 'Here, we sell mostly fruit and vegetables.' But to do so, she said, the government would need to do more to encourage traders to stay, including constructing new piers for offloading goods and helping them raise their earnings – which she believes is unlikely given the cost involved. In any case, Huynh said, the market would lose its authenticity and its cultural value. 'In my mind, it would not be the same,' she said. By 8am, the day's trade has ended at Cai Rang. The sun has risen high above the palm-lined riverbanks, and vendors are relaxing on their houseboats. But Linh, the tour guide, doubts the serenity will last and expects Cai Rang to close within a few years. 'Then I'll have to look for a new job,' she said.
Al Jazeera
28-02-2025
- Business
- Al Jazeera
Vietnam's floating markets face uncertain future as life moves onshore
Can Tho, Vietnam – As dawn breaks over Can Tho, the city's river is filled with the roaring engines of tour boats. In the distance, traditional wooden houseboats emerge through the dim light as the Cai Rang Floating Market comes into view. Cai Rang, and other markets like it, were once among the most recognisable cultural icons of southern Vietnam, with a history dating back to the early 20th Century. Before the development of roads and bridges, the myriad waterways of the delta region were the primary means of trade and transport, leading to the development of floating markets where channels converged. But over the last two decades, the markets have dwindled in size in tandem with Vietnam's rapid economic development – first gradually, then suddenly – and only two of the region's 10 major markets retain any significant presence. 'When I first visited [Cai Rang] market in 2011, it was much larger,' Linh, a local guide, told Al Jazeera. 'Now it's about a third of that size,' said Linh, who led daily tours to the market up until a few years ago. Today, Cai Rang comprises about 200 vessels, fewer than half as many as during its peak in the 1990s. Nearby Phong Dien market has shrunk to fewer than a dozen boats and has largely disappeared from tourist itineraries. Cai Be, a once-thriving market in neighbouring Ben Tre province, is among those that have vanished completely, closing for good in 2021. Historically the biggest of the delta's markets, Cai Rang still resembles a decent-sized assembly of boats – at least from afar. On closer inspection, the market looks more sparse. Nowadays, tour boats make up a significant portion of the traffic on the water. Still, the market functions much as it always has, as sampans are loaded up with produce from larger 'wholesalers', which is then brought back to markets on land. For many sellers, the boats double as homes. Daily life is on full display as the boat dwellers wash dishes with water from the river, cook meals over small stoves, or relax in hammocks – often with children and pet dogs in tow. Yet behind the photogenic charm, anxieties linger. 'Business is not good,' Phuc, who works at the market selling pineapples to tourists, told Al Jazeera. Sometimes she sells just 10 pineapples a day at 20,000 Vietnamese dong ($0.78) each. 'Only in the high season is it possible to make enough money. The rest of the time, we are barely surviving.' Until two years ago, Phuc and her husband worked as wholesalers selling yams. Every week for the previous 25 years, they would travel to Long An province, near Ho Chi Minh City, to restock their boat – a process that took several days there and back. But as road infrastructure has improved in the last decade, land-based trade has become faster and more cost-effective, supplanting the need for river-based commerce. 'The only people who continue to work here are those who can't afford to buy a van or a big car [to deliver produce],' her husband, Thanh, told Al Jazeera. Tuyen, who works as a wholesaler selling onions, garlic and sweet potatoes, is also downbeat. 'Ten years ago, I used to earn good money doing this, but now it's just enough to get by,' she told Al Jazeera, while preparing a breakfast of fish soup on her boat. 'Everything is more difficult now.' Tuyen said the COVID-19 pandemic was a turning point, after which many sellers, unable to make ends meet, switched to working on land. Asked why she did not join them, she pointed to the rental fees for a market spot – about five million Vietnamese dong ($195). On the boat, she has no rent to pay. 'I'd prefer to stay on land – it's more comfortable and convenient – but I don't have the money,' she said. While improved roads are often cited as the reason for the markets' decline, other factors have played a part. Many smaller markets have struggled to recover from temporary closures during the pandemic, as health and safety regulations prompted a shift to land-based markets. Poor planning has further exacerbated the situation. To address the annual flooding of the Mekong Delta, the authorities have in recent years constructed flood prevention walls along the banks of the Can Tho river, one of its many waterways. While these walls have helped reduce flooding and erosion, the absence of piers has made it harder for river-based trade to continue. Broader cultural shifts also cast a cloud over the future of the floating market. As Vietnam modernises, younger generations are turning their backs on their parents' trade, seeking better education and career opportunities. 'My daughter doesn't want to work here,' Phuc said. 'She prefers to work on her own terms for a company and invest in stocks. She's not like us – she doesn't like this life.' Though vendors may worry about the future, Cai Rang's survival appears to be of little consequence to the average resident of the nearby city of Can Tho. These days, most people shop in supermarkets and shopping malls and have little reason to visit Cai Rang. 'For me, it's nothing special,' a hotel receptionist, who has visited the market only once, told Al Jazeera, asking not to be named. Yet tourism contributes approximately 6 percent to the city's economy, with Cai Rang Floating Market the main draw. In 2017, the city welcomed 7.5 million tourists, according to official figures. While arrivals hit 5.9 million in 2023 after dropping off to practically nothing during the pandemic, the numbers remain significantly below their peak. Much of this is due to the consequences of the pandemic and a reduced number of flights from other parts of Vietnam, according to Son Ca Huynh, who runs a tour company in Can Tho. If the floating market should close, efforts to revive tourism are likely to become harder still. Huynh, who is branching out into cooking classes and off-the-beaten-track canal boat tours, said efforts to preserve the market could focus on its appeal to tourists, citing the floating markets of Bangkok as an example, rather than its commercial function. 'At the Bangkok markets, they sell many different things,' Huynh told Al Jazeera. 'Here, we sell mostly fruit and vegetables.' But to do so, she said, the government would need to do more to encourage traders to stay, including constructing new piers for offloading goods and helping them raise their earnings – which she believes is unlikely given the cost involved. In any case, Huynh said, the market would lose its authenticity and its cultural value. 'In my mind, it would not be the same,' she said. By 8am, the day's trade has ended at Cai Rang. The sun has risen high above the palm-lined riverbanks, and vendors are relaxing on their houseboats. But Linh, the tour guide, doubts the serenity will last and expects Cai Rang to close within a few years. 'Then I'll have to look for a new job,' she said.
Yahoo
27-01-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
‘Napalm Girl' Rips Documentary That Questions Truth of Iconic Photograph
A new documentary purports that a Pulitzer Prize-winning Associated Press photographer did not take a picture that became a hallmark image from the Vietnam War. The photo's subject begs to differ. In a blistering statement, Kim Phuc bashed the filmmakers of The Stringer for an 'outrageous and false attack' on Nick Ut, a former AP photographer who captured a 9-year-old Phuc running away in horror after a napalm bomb fell on her South Vietnamese village and left her severely burned. The image quickly circulated around the world, earning her the moniker 'Napalm Girl.' The Stringer, which premiered at the Sundance Film Festival on Saturday after a two-year investigation by photojournalist Gary Knight and others, dives into former AP photo editor Carl Robinson's claim that the historic photo was actually taken by a Vietnamese stringer. 'I have refused to participate in this outrageous and false attack on Nick Ut raised by Mr. Robinson over the past years and never responded to his email requesting that I talk with him. I hope he finds peace in his life,' Phuc wrote in a statement. 'I have no memory of those minutes but l would never participate in the Gary Knight film because I know it is false.' Phuc admitted she does not remember Ut taking the image, owing to the trauma of her burning. But she said her uncle and brother (who was five at the time and is also in the photo) 'repeatedly' recounted the day's events, including how Ut took them to a local hospital to get treated. 'I have no doubt in my mind and heart that it was Nick who ran towards me to capture the famous photo,' she said. 'Nick took the image and he deserves the credit he has received. He is a good man who fully deserves to be treated with respect.' The statement—provided by attorney Jim Hornstein, who is representing Ut against the filmmakers—helps set up a legal battle between Ut and those behind the documentary. The Associated Press said in a statement on Sunday its own six-month investigation, which produced a 22-page report, concluded Ut took the 1972 photograph. Hornstein told the Daily Beast on Monday he planned to file a defamation lawsuit against the filmmakers and the VII Foundation, which produced the film, to help clear Ut's name. 'We will be seeking to vindicate Nick Ut's reputation,' Hornstein told the Daily Beast. Knight, the executive director of the VII Foundation who led the investigation, said in an email that producers 'believe Kim Phuc believes Nick Ut took this photo' and 'we would never challenge her beliefs.' But he also noted Phuc's admission that she did not remember the events of that day. Knight said that Phuc declined to speak to his team despite multiple outreaches. He also said the filmmakers did not question that Phuc's uncle told her about the day's events—and that Ut took the photo, but they could not identify her uncle in any of the film footage or photos they had from that day. 'We are open to examining any new images that come to light of course,' he wrote. Some facts surrounding the image are not in dispute. The film reel containing the photo was taken back to the AP's Saigon bureau, where Robinson was the photo editor on duty. After seeing the image, Robinson deemed it violated the AP's editorial standards and chose not to run it. After chief of photos Horst Faas came back from his lunch break and saw the image, he made the decision to run it. The photo was publicly monikered 'The Terror of War' and became a hallmark of Ut's career, winning him a Pulitzer Prize at 22 and cementing him and Faas as photojournalism legends. Faas died in 2012. What diverges, however, is who took the photo and how its credit was administered. The Stringer contends that Ut could not have taken that particular photo, claiming he was not in the proper position despite taking other photos of Phuc that day. It cites satellite imagery and three-dimensional models to make the case—and the testimony of Nguyen Thanh Nghe, the then-stringer who claimed he took the photo, and Robinson, the photo editor. Robinson says in the film that he saw multiple images that day: the iconic image of Phuc, which included a stringer's name, and another one taken by Ut that showed her from the side. 'That was actually my pick, because it was discrete,' Robinson says. He initially opted not to run the first photo before being overruled by Faas, who argued the photo's honest depiction of war overruled the standards. But when it came time to add a credit to the image, Robinson says, Faas ordered him to add Ut's name instead of a stringer's. 'Horst Faas, who had been standing right next to me said, 'Nick Ut. Make it 'Nick Ut.' Make it 'staff.' Make it Nick Ut,'' Robinson says in the film. Robinson says he obliged, a decision he 'felt bad' making because he 'wasn't courageous enough' to push back. Robinson told Vanity Fair he relayed the story in private conversations over the years—including to photojournalist David Burnett, who was at the scene at the time—though never publicly. Burnett told the magazine, however, that he 'didn't give it much credence' and remembered hearing Faas praise Ut for his 'good work' in capturing the frame. 'That's verbatim what he said that day,' Burnett said. 'We all heard it.' Robinson also told Vanity Fair he shared his secret to AP correspondent Peter Arnett, claiming he didn't want to make the accusation while Faas was alive to spare him embarrassment. But Arnett, after contacting people like then-photo darkroom editor Yuichi 'Jackson' Ishizaki and ex-bureau chief Richard Pyle, also found the claim meritless and wondered if Robinson was acting on a vendetta over Ut's success and his own firing from the AP in 1978. (Knight said Arnett did not respond to his team's requests for comment.) 'I don't fully understand why Carl Robinson launched his failing attempts to discredit two of the great photographers of our time, Horst Faas and Nick Ut,' he told the AP, according to its report. 'But maybe it is jealousy.' Pyle, a close friend of Robinson, also cast doubt on the claim. In an email he sent to Arnett in 2015, parts of which were shared by Hornstein with the Daily Beast, Pyle characterized the claim as 'strangely reckless story spreading' and he told Robinson the claims had 'no plausible merit.' Instead, Pyle pondered, Robinson 'for his own mysterious reasons, seems bent on his personal crusade.' Pyle died in 2017. Knight said his team was aware that Pyle and Arnett did not believe Robinson's account and did not take any witnesses' statement at face value. 'Which is why we interviewed 55 people, read hundreds of pages of testimonies, watched hours of video footage, examined hundreds of photographs, and engaged one of the worlds leading forensic investigation teams to analyse the evidence,' he wrote. Hornstein, Ut's lawyer, said he has brought in another lawyer to file the defamation suit against the filmmakers, but he would not disclose their name. Knight said he welcomed Hornstein's outreach. 'It stretches credulity to believe the one man who can testify to this is Carl Robinson and everyone else is totally oblivious to it or dead,' Hornstein said.
