A survey conducted by Prof. Dr. Nguyen Dinh Duc from Vietnam National University – Hanoi reveals that in 10 years from 2009, the number of Vietnamese articles published in international scientific journals increased fivefold (between 1,764 articles in 2009 to 8,234 in 2018).
After the introduction of Resolution No.29 in 2013, which promotes scientific research in different fields, only in 2 years from 2017-2018, leading universities in Vietnam possess around 10,000 research result reports announced internationally.
Statistics of Web of Science (WoS) and SCOPUS also display that in 2018, the quantity of annual international announcements related to research result reached nearly 10,000, 70 percent of which belongs to tertiary educational institutes. Vietnam National University – Hanoi and Vietnam National University – Ho Chi Minh City are the two with the most articles.
Minister of Education and Training Phung Xuan Nha commented that since 2014, 23 universities in Vietnam have piloted comprehensive autonomy in operation, in accordance with Resolution No.77 by the Government. This means more organizational-scaled prizes and awards for successful research and published articles.
Following that was the implementation of the Law on Higher Education on July 1, 2019. They have become the driving force for bustling scientific research activities among tertiary educational institutes in the country, leading to an impressive breakthrough in both training and researching tasks.
As a consequence, in 2019, Vietnamese tertiary education was ranked 68/196 nations worldwide, an increase of 12 positions compared to 2018. 2019 was also the first year that 4 Vietnamese universities appeared in the list of Top-1000 Global Best Universities and 11 in the list of Top-500 Asian Best Universities.
Prof. Dr. Nguyen Dinh Duc voiced his opinion that there should be different policies for research groups of different fields. These policies should be sensibly adjusted to ensure the highest performance possible. He then shared that basically, research groups are divided into 3 groups of organizational, national, and international levels, with different financial needs.
Prof. Nguyen Van Tuan from New South Wales University (Australia) suggested that Vietnamese higher educational institutes need to clearly identify their research goals to fulfill the ultimate one of socio-economic growth.
Director of Vietnamese National University – Ho Chi Minh City Vu Hai Quan said that national universities must be bolder to apply breakthrough investment mechanisms to boost scientific research, with a clearer vision.
“A true scientist doesn’t conduct research for the sake of awards or prizes. Rather, he or she must treat research as a lifetime mission, a passion. No matter what the motto of a university is, its teaching staff must carry out scientific research to have a sustainable development”, stated Associate Prof. Dr. Bach Long Giang from Nguyen Tat Thanh University.
