Dr. Do Hoai Nam, President of the Vietnamese Academy of Social Sciences (VASS) in Vietnam, will visit Korea with eight members of the VASS delegation from July 11 to 17, 2010 by invitation of the Korea Foundation.

Dr. Nam, as a member of the Central Committee of the Vietnamese Communist Party, was a member of the National Assembly of Vietnam from 2002 to 2007 and became the President of the Vietnamese Academy of Social Sciences (VASS) in 2003. The VASS, established in 1953 as a primary think-tank of the Vietnamese government, currently comprises 31 institutes with a total of more than 2,000 researchers. Among the institutes, the Institute of Northeast Asian Studies has seven centers for regional studies, including the Center for Korean Studies. The mission of the VASS is to provide the Vietnamese government with advice on its policies and promote research on Vietnamese society and international relations of Vietnam.

During his stay in Korea, Dr. Nam will visit the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Ministry of Strategy and Finance, the Ministry of Culture, Sport and Tourism, the Korea Development Institute (KDI), the Korea Institute for International Economic Policy (KIEP), the Korea Economic Research Institute (KERI), the National Research Council for Economics, the Humanities and Social Sciences, Korea Rural Economic Institute (KREI) and the Korea Saemaul Undong Center. The purpose of his visit is to study Korea’s experience of economic development and devise a Vietnamese model for ‘peaceful and sustainable development’ that will be critical for Vietnam to overcome the ‘middle income trap’ it currently faces. He will also visit the G-20 Summit Committee, the Korea Institute for National Unification and Seoul National University.

In addition, he will have opportunities to experience various other aspects of Korea by visiting Samsung Electronics and touring museums and historical sites in Seoul.