Vietnam Education Publishing House will immediately print 10 million additional textbooks, plus the number of books currently in stock, the number of books supplied to flood areas will be about 18 million copies.

On September 18, Associate Professor, Dr. Nguyen Van Tung - Deputy Editor-in-Chief of Vietnam Education Publishing House said that in order to implement the direction of the Ministry of Education and Training on providing textbooks for students in flood-affected areas, this unit will devote all its efforts to carry out the task.

In the immediate future, the Vietnam Education Publishing House will immediately print 10 million additional textbooks. Combined with the number of books currently in stock, the Vietnam Education Publishing House will provide about 18 million textbooks to the flood-affected areas. In the next 1-2 weeks, after having accurate data on the needs of localities, if there is still a shortage, this unit will organize additional printing.

According to Mr. Tung, the average cost of printing and processing 10 million copies of books is estimated at less than 30 billion VND. All additional printed textbooks provided to students affected by storms and floods will be deployed in a spirit of service. For the number of textbooks printed by the Vietnam Education Publishing House to provide to flood-affected areas, a 10% reduction in cover price (equivalent to about 50% of the distribution cost) will be applied.

Vietnam Education Publishing House will also allocate a budget to donate a large number of textbooks to students in severely damaged areas. As of September 18, this unit has donated 2,200 sets of textbooks to the most severely damaged provinces such as Yen Bai, Lao Cai, Lang Son, Tuyen Quang, Thai Nguyen... worth 550 million VND. Through the education sector union, Vietnam Education Publishing House has also donated 620 million VND to people in flood-affected areas.

According to statistics from the Ministry of Education and Training, data reported by 18/26 provinces and centrally-run cities sent to the ministry showed that as of September 16, the total damage to facilities and teaching equipment was estimated at 1,260 billion VND.

Statistics also show that over 41,500 sets of textbooks were damaged, including nearly 24,000 sets of primary school textbooks; nearly 10,600 sets of middle school textbooks and over 7,000 sets of high school textbooks. The locality with the most damage to textbooks was Yen Bai with nearly 28,700 sets, followed by Cao Bang with over 7,400 sets, and Quang Ninh with nearly 3,400 sets.

Previously, on September 9, the Ministry of Education and Training issued Official Dispatch No. 5212/BGDĐT-GDTrH to departments of education and training and publishers of printing and distributing textbooks on the supply of textbooks to localities affected by storm No. 3.

Accordingly, implementing the Prime Minister's direction on focusing on emergency response to storm No. 3 (storm YAGI) and post-storm floods, to proactively overcome the consequences of storm No. 3 and prepare conditions to welcome students back to school, the Ministry of Education and Training requested departments to proactively review and compile statistics on damage to facilities, teaching equipment, textbooks and school supplies of schools and students caused by storms and floods to have a plan to overcome and report to competent authorities.

Departments of education and training promptly support and help students, families with preferential policies, students in difficult circumstances, and students affected by rain and storms to stabilize their studies; implement solutions to ensure safe and effective teaching and learning at schools.

At the launching ceremony, leaders of the Ministry of Education and Training, units and individuals inside and outside the education sector donated a total of more than 6.6 billion VND. The donation activities will continue in the coming days.

For units organizing the compilation and distribution of textbooks, the Ministry of Education and Training recommends proactively coordinating with localities to review and promptly grasp the situation of textbooks damaged by the impact of storm No. 3 to urgently print additional books and promptly supply them to teachers and students to organize teaching and learning, prioritizing students in the first and last grades; not to let a shortage of textbooks occur.

Publishing units coordinate with departments of education and training to proactively support textbooks, notebooks, and school supplies for students from families with preferential policies and students who suffered heavy losses due to rain and storms to soon stabilize their studies./.