Briefs on some of the leading news stories published Wednesday (April 23) in Tuoi Tre (Youth) newspaper:

Politics

-- Party General Secretary Nguyen Phu Trong on Wednesday paid a visit to the northern province of Lang Son. During his trip, the general secretary emphasized that building new rural models should be put in focus to develop the locality in the near future.

-- A delegation from the Vietnam Coast Guard Command on Tuesday visited people and soldiers in the Bach Long Vi island district in the northern province of Hai Phong. The delegation called on the island’s radar station, defense battalion, border station, and the coast guard station.

Society

-- According to the Department of Agriculture and Rural Development of the Central Highlands province of Lam Dong, around 200 ha of vegetable has been damaged by four hailstorms and tornadoes since the beginning of this month.

-- The Ministry of Health has recently launched a crusade which calls on medical staff to behave kindly toward patients. “Healthcare workers always have to say thank you, be gentle, pay attention to patients, and help them,” Minister of Health Nguyen Thi Kim Tien said during teleconference with 700 hospitals on Wednesday.

-- Ho Chi Minh City will keep an eye on eight hot spots of dengue which have seen a large number of dengue patients during the last five years. The number of dengue patients in those places annually accounts for half of the city’s total.

Business

-- The amount of frozen pork exported from the EU to Vietnam has reached 6,100 metric tons, up 7.5 times while beef has topped 1,000 metric tons, a six-fold increase, during the last three years. The number is expected to rise by five percent after the “European Meat’s Tradition and Quality” campaign launched by the Union of Producers and Employers of Meat Industry in Vietnam ends in July, Agnieszka Rozanska, vice chairman of the union, said.

-- The Australian Department of Agriculture has sent a dispatch to the Department of Plant Protection under the Vietnamese Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development, announcing the country has officially opened its doors for litchi to be imported from Vietnam.

-- Exporters have said the price of Vietnamese rice has gone down to the lowest on the list of the world’s main rice exporting countries.

Lifestyle

-- An exhibition titled “Antiques Collected in 40 Years” kicked off on Wednesday at the Ho Chi Minh City History Museum. The event displaying 250 objects collected since Vietnam’s reunification in April 1975 will run at the museum at 2 Nguyen Binh Khiem Street in District 1 until October.