The assessment council of the Ministry of Construction has agreed to recognize Vung Tau as a first-grade city of the southern coastal province of Ba Ria Vung Tau, as proposed by the local government.

The construction ministry last Saturday convened a council to assess the project to recognize Vung Tau as the level-one city, said Phan Hoa Binh, chairman of Vung Tau City. After considering and referring to the current criteria on standards and targets, council members agreed to name Vung Tau as the first-grade city with an average score of 89.86 points, higher than the minimum requirement of 70 points. The council’s appraisal shows that Vung Tau has up to 39 out of 40 targets equivalent or higher compared to the criteria. Nine targets of the city reach the minimum level while it has only one target failing to reach the allowable level. For instance, the city’s data on population density (10,161 persons a square kilometer), per-capita-income (over US$6,000 a person), poverty rate (5.3%), housing floor space in the city center (19.94 square meters per capita) or clean water (150 liters a person a day) among others are all qualified. Vung Tau is known as a hub of economy, culture, science-technology, education-training, and tourism-services. At the same time, it is one of the most developed areas of the HCMC Region. The council therefore deems it necessary to upgrade Vung Tau into a level-1 city. To turn Vung Tau into a sustainable city, members of the council proposed solutions and development orientation for the city in the near future. The solutions focus on responding to climate change, developing technical infrastructure, applying proper waste treatment technology and improving drainage systems. With the recognition of Vung Tau City as a first-grade city, Vietnam has currently ten first-grade cities under provincial management, namely Vung Tau, Hue, Vinh, Dalat, Nha Trang, Quy Nhon, Buon Me Thuot, Thai Nguyen, Nam Dinh and Viet Tri. Besides, there are also three centrally-governed cities namely Haiphong, Danang and Can Tho.