Photo for illustration. Source: ntu.edu.vn

PANO - The United States Agency for International Development (USAID) on July 24th held an event at the US Embassy’s American Centre in Hanoi to award the winners of a video contest launched by USAID to engage Vietnamese youth in addressing the country’s development challenges.

Over 50 videos were submitted from students in 36 universities throughout the country. These video entries address a variety of issues, ranging from environmental pollution, education, traffic, orphanages and street children, urbanization, school violence, LGBT issues and agriculture development to the maintenance of traditional arts and historic sites.

“The videos submitted show the creative ideas that young people bring to development issues in their communities,’’ said U​SAID Mission Director, Joakim Parker, “Sound development depends on the involvement of young people at the local as well as global level.”

After his remarks, Mr. Parker presented the prize winners of the contest with awards and certificates of recognition from USAID. Below is the list of the three prize winners.

The first prize, including a MacBook Air and a certificate of recognition from USAID/Vietnam, came to the Xanh team (Nguyen Quang Co, Do Huy Tao, Le Thi Thu Thao) for their video “Changes Within Reach” on environmental protection through recycling, reusing and repurposing.

Meanwhile, author Hoang Trieu To pocketed an iPhone 6 and a certificate of recognition from USAID/Vietnam with his work “Hope” on education for ethnic minority children, and author Vo Thi Minh Ngoc won the third prize (an IPad mini and a certificate of recognition from USAID/Vietnam) with her “Biking for the Earth” on environmental protection through encouraging more people to cycle.

Launched in January, the USAID contest encouraged Vietnamese students to create a video that demonstrates a development issue in their community and propose a solution that they think could tackle it. Through this contest, USAID expects to better understand youth’s ideas and approaches in addressing development issues and this will help USAID create programs that better support them, helping them to become part of the solution to today’s challenges.

Viet Anh