Over recent years, the Da Nang Overseas Vietnamese (OV) Business Club has actively been engaged in appealing for Vietnamese people living abroad to make remarkable dedication towards the city’s progress through many highly-practical activities.

Members from the Da Nang OV Business Club competing in a marathon event held in the city

Currently, there are a total of about 18,000 OVs whose hometowns are in Da Nang, are settling down in such foreign countries as the US, Canada, Australia, France, Germany and Belgium.

In particular, despite living far away from their roots, OVs communities worldwide have become more actively engaged in making their great efforts for the city’s progress.

The OVs communities have always maintained their stable lives abroad, confidently integrated into their adopted countries, and preserved the identity of their country of birth.

Furthermore, they have stayed connected to the Vietnamese language and culture, and maintained their active involvement in safeguarding the country’s sovereignty over its sea and islands.

According to the municipal Department of Foreign Affairs, 102 overseas Vietnamese businesses now operate in the city with a total registered capital of nearly 2,000 billion VND.

The amount of investment has been poured into such aspects as investment consultancy, construction, real estates, hi-tech energy production, software outsourcing, education, accommodations, production and trade, tourism, services, and more.

Eight years ago Mr Bao Hoa, a Vietnamese man living in the US, decided to come back to his beloved hometown in Da Nang for long-time settlement and doing business here.

The man founded Caracoli CRC Co Ltd in 2013, now known as the Vinatech Connect Co Ltd, which, last year, helped a total of 6 large companies and corporations worldwide to seek investment opportunities in Da Nang, and Viet Nam as a whole.

He is now the Vice Chairman of the Club, affirming that wherever they are, many OVs always look toward their homeland.

In recent years, the Club has actively appealed to many OVs worldwide to be involved in conducting transfer technology, and accelerating the development of the local society, culture and education. Also, the organisation has given suggestions about developing and issuing policies and laws about protecting the interests of OVs.

Besides, Mr Hoa added, his agency’ members have shown their active engagement in social activities such as the opening of foreign language clubs, marathons and the planting of trees along coastal routes.

A Vietnamese American man, Mr Danny Nguyen, the Vice Chairman of the Board of Directors of Transpacific Investment Fund LLC, has planned to accelerate the construction of an EMASI international school in the city.

Ms Nguyen Dai Trang, a member of the Canada-Viet Nam Trade Council, who live in Canada, gave her helping hand to the organisation of an investment promotion workshops in this North American country within the framework of the 2018 visit made by the Da Nang leaders.

Another OV person who has participated in numerous charity projects across Viet Nam is 67- year-old Celice Le Pham, who lives in France.

She is a member of the broad of directors of the Association for Orphans and Destitute Children in Viet Nam (ASSORV), a non-profit organisation under the French law of 1901, founded in 1992 in the Val de Marne department. 

Memories about her attendance in the inauguration ceremony of the ASSORV-built Hoa Mai Orphan Care Centre in 2002 have remained deep in her mind.

Celice Le Pham (2nd left) and other ASSORV representatives visiting children at the Hoa Mai Orphan Care Centre

The orphanage shelters and cares for a total of 50 orphaned children. It is highly praised as an ideal place where they are listened to, protected, and educated in order to learn to be happy in their lives.

The kind-hearted woman has participated in many volunteer activities to help the impoverished across Viet Nam over the past year. She herself organised many charitable trips to the mountainous districts of Bac Tra My, Nam Tra My, Dong Giang, Tay Giang and Nam Giang in Quang Nam Province, plus remote areas in the Quang Tri and Thua Thien-Hue provinces.

In 2017, Celice Le Pham and a relief team presented gift packages, containing warm blankets, clothes, rice, food, and medicine to hundreds of needy residents living in floods-ravaged areas in the city.

Each year, she funded the construction cost of between 3 and 5 houses, worth  50 million VND each, for poor families throughout Quang Nam, Da Nang, Thua Thien Hue, Quang Tri, Ca Mau and Soc Trang.

Furthermore, she has coordinated with a group of specialist doctors from the US to offer medical examinations and medicine free-of-charge to the needy in mountainous and disadvantaged areas.

In addition, ASSORV organised a seminar on appealing for FDI inflows into the city’s real estate market, with the participation of representatives from the Vietnamese Real Estate Professionals in the USA.