Two Vietnamese agencies elected to ESCAP organisations’ governing councils

The General Statistics Office (GSO) of Vietnam and the Vietnam Institute of Agricultural Engineering and Post-Harvest Technology (VIAEP) on May 25 were elected to the Governing Councils of the Statistical Institute for Asia and the Pacific (SIAP) and the Centre for Sustainable Agricultural Mechanisation (CSAM) under the United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (ESCAP).

Deputy PM Vu Duc Dam speaking at the opening of the ESCAP’s 78th session. (Photo: VNA)
Deputy PM Vu Duc Dam speaking at the opening of the ESCAP’s 78th session. (Photo: VNA)

The elections were conducted within the framework of the ESCAP’s 78th session held in Bangkok.

SIAP is a professional statistics training centre for government officials and others working on official statistics. It offers short- and long-term training specifically to strengthen knowledge and build skills of national governments' employees to produce, use, and share reliable statistics, including for the monitoring of the Sustainable Development Goals and the development of fact-based policy.

Meanwhile, CSAM, based in Beijing, aims to enhance technical cooperation among the members and associate members of ESCAP as well as other interested member states of the UN, through extensive exchange of information and sharing of knowledge, and promotion of research and development and agro-business development in the area of sustainable agricultural mechanisation and technology transfer for the attainment of the internationally agreed development goals including the Millennium Development Goals in the Asia-Pacific region.

The Governing Councils of SIAP and CSAM each comprise of the representative of the host country and eight other members elected by ESCAP members.

Established 1947, ESCAP is one of the five regional commissions of the UN Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC). The commission promotes cooperation among its 53 member states and nine associate members in pursuit of solutions to sustainable development challenges.

The annual session will be an opportunity to review achievements of the Asia-Pacific region in socio-economic development and discuss future cooperation and linkage to deal with challenges.

Deputy Prime Minister Vu Duc Dam attended and delivered a speech at the opening of the ESCAP’s 78th session on May 23.