Despite being only 37 years old, Vu Xuan Thanh, hailing from Thanh Hoa Province, has got involved in volunteer work for more than 17 years, thereby helping thousands of unfortunate people, most of whom are victims of Agent Orange (AO).

Vu Xuan Thanh (left) donates VND55 million to support the city's Care Center for AO Victims and Unfortunate Children. Photo: LE HUNG

Understanding and sharing with unfortunate people

From a very young age, Thanh followed his father to give gifts and money to the poor. Therefore, he has great passion for doing volunteer work. However, it was not until 2006 when he was a freshman, he really started his charity journey.

Since then, Thanh has become a representative of the French Association for the Protection of Vietnamese Children with Dioxin (VNED).

Together with VNED, Thanh has supported AO-affected children in 27 provinces and cities nationwide by providing monthly allowance, interest-free loans and scholarships.

In February 2023, he quitted his job at the Ho Chi Minh City University of Architecture in order to have a lot of time to connect with organisations and individuals at both home and abroad to help needy children.

In June 2019, Thanh met the founders of Give.Asia and shared his wishes and dreams with them. After that, he became the representative of Give.Asia in Viet Nam to help AO-affected children and other poor people.

“At Give.Asia, I met many like-minded people and especially was able to help more poor people. Therefore, I officially quitted my full-time job at the Ho Chi Minh City University of Architecture. Currently, I am a lecture at a number of universities in Ho Chi Minh City to have time to learn about, call for financial support and help many unfortunate children and poor families. Till date, we have partnered with 34 hospitals and 12 NGOs to help the poor across Viet Nam. A total of more than VND11.5 billion was raised from 468 campaigns to help the needy" Thanh informed.

Open door to future

As a person who loves community activities, Thanh chooses the most special object to help.

“For me, children, especially those affected by AO who are born in peace but are deformed are the most special case. Many of them suffer from many serious diseases. Therefore, I want to make a small contribution to help them have a comprehensive and hopeful view of the bright future" Thanh remarked.

According to Thanh, the city’s Care Center for AO Victims and Unfortunate Children provides free life skills and physical therapy courses for AO-affected children. This not only benefits children but also helps their families, especially parents, to be “liberated” to focus on making end meet to potentially break the cycle of poverty.

However, due to the impact of COVID-19, many large benefactors stopped funding the center, which led to the risk of children having to stay at home due to insufficient operating and care costs.

“This prompted me to create a campaign to raise funds from the community, and philanthropists from all over the world to form a community ready to support 110 AO-affected children every month. This will help them continue to get vocational training courses and give them confidence and opportunity to create value to contribute to their families and society” he added.

Most recently, he has raised a fund of VND55 million for the center and sets a target of VND1.3 billion per year.

He hopes that more benefactors will support the campaign to open the door to the future for children affected by AO.

Reporting by LE HUNG - Translating by M.DUNG