At the meeting, Ms. Nguyen Thi Thanh Hoa introduced to the Ambassador about fine traditions of Vietnamese women, their contribution to the national construction and defense, affirmed that women of various walks of life in Vietnam have been promoting the spirit of famous female figures in the history of Vietnam like the two Trung sisters and lady Trieu, demonstrating their roles in the period of national renovation and international integration.

VWU President also briefed about the VWU’s structure and its key tasks and activities. She highlighted that the VWU has gained outstanding achievements in implementing its representative function, taking care of and protecting legal rights and legitimate interests of Vietnamese women, contributing to their development and advancement, but it, is still facing many challenges, especially the research, and policy formulation capacity of its staff at central level and the quality of grassroots staff performance remain limited.

Other women related challenges also exist in the country such as poverty feminization, gender inequality, HIV/AIDS, human trafficking, domestic violence etc.

Taking this opportunity, VWU President showed high appreciation to the Netherlands Government and Dutch partners for their valuable support and assistance over the past years for Vietnam in general, for the VWU and Vietnamese women in particular via development projects in the areas of women entrepreneurship promotion, domestic violence prevention and control, capacity building for the VWU and women in Vietnam... She expressed her expectations of further exchanging and sharing information, promoting the cooperation between the two sides, and invited the Ambassador to visit VWU activity models in localities.

Ms. NienkeTrooster showed her happiness to visit the VWU and was impressed with outstanding achievements of Vietnam in the process of the country renovation, gender equality and the contributions of the VWU as well as Vietnamese women.

The Ambassador said that in the Netherlands, a developed country with progress o­n gender equality, women have more opportunities to assert their role. However, in the country there still exists gender inequality reflected through low proportion of women in management and leadership, domestic violence...

Ms. Nienke Trooster expressed her wish to strengthen bilateral cooperation between the two countries, affirming that VWU is o­ne of important partners in Vietnam o­n her agenda. She highlighted that the two sides will find creative and appropriate cooperation forms to share about women issues, particularly to promote women’s participation in politics, strengthen capacity of VWU staff and improve communication quality.