Features

Preparing Viet Nam's Workers of Today for the Jobs of Tomorrow: Report Card

ADB helped Viet Nam improve its vocational and technical education system to meet the growing demand for skilled industry workers in the country.


Free Trade: Untangling Asia’s Noodle Bowl

Over the past decade, trade liberalization initiatives have blossomed across Asia and the Pacific, creating a convoluted 'noodle bowl' of overlapping free trade agreements (FTAs). Here’s a by-the-numbers look at trade liberalization and economic integration in the region.


Better Health Care, Education to Resettled in Viet Nam

A hydropower energy project in Central Viet Nam has disrupted the lives of an isolated ethnic minority, but offers better health care and educational opportunities for a bright future.


Resettlement Puts Women on Top in Central Viet Nam

Though the Song Bung 4 hydropower dam and energy project relocated Co Tu minority in Viet Nam’s central region, it also offered new income opportunities and empowered local women.


Viet Nam's Co Tu People Find New Voice through Resettlement

While the Song Bung 4 Hydropower project disrupted the lifestyle of the Co Tu ethnic group in central Viet Nam, it also became an opportunity for its members, especially women and children, to gain better education, health care, and improve their income opportunities.


Costs of Higher Education by the Numbers

Rising costs in higher education are outstripping the capacity of students to pay for fees and of states to fund the sector, raising questions about how to make it more inclusive in the future. Here’s a by the number look at some of the issues leading to rising higher education costs in the Asia and the Pacific region.


By the Numbers: Asia's Looming Pension Crisis

This feature provides a snapshot, by the numbers, of the key issues discussed in ADB's book, Pension Systems in East and Southeast Asia: Promoting Fairness and Sustainability.


Greater Mekong Subregion Program: 12 Things to Know

The six member countries of the Greater Mekong Subregion Program mark 20 years of economic cooperation in 2012.


Blueprint for a Stable Rice Market

ASEAN nations can help avoid world rice price shocks by reducing export restrictions, placing less emphasis on self-sufficiency, retooling Thailand's rice pledging program, and expanding coordinated rice policies with India and Pakistan, according to a series of working papers from ADB.


Has the world learned from the 2007–2008 food price crisis?

To avoid a repeat of the rice price crisis, ASEAN member countries formulated the ASEAN Integrated Food Security Framework with a Strategic Plan of Action that focuses on establishing a regional emergency rice reserve, facilitating regional rice trade, developing an ASEAN food security information system, and pursuing innovations through research and development.