Bothnic Marine Spatial Planning Translated into Vietnamese
In May 2013 the HELCOM Secretariat received an unexpected email from Vietnam, asking for permission to translate the book Planning the Bothnian Sea into Vietnamese. Five months later, in October 2013, HELCOM were astonished to receive an email with a complete Vietnamese version of the book. Every single word and graph on the 153 original pages had been meticulously translated by Department of Sustainable Development and Response to Climate Change at the Hanoi-based Development Strategy Institute (DSI), under the Ministry of Planning and Investment of Vietnam.
Find the Vietnamese version of Planning the Bothnian Sea.
The book, the final report of a HELCOM-led project on planning the future of the offshore Bothnian Sea, a part of northern Baltic Sea situated between Åland Islands and the Quark (Umeå-Vasa), had been released a year earlier. The initiative has been part of HELCOMs efforts to develop transboundary ecosystem based maritime spatial planning (MSP) in the region in cooperation with VASAB, another regional organization.
Even if the book had already received international recognition for its substance and particularly for its design, most of the attention so far had been European. We were charmed by this sudden overseas interest and naturally replied positively.
After the initial excitement had worn off HELCOM developed a curiosity on the purpose behind the translation. To find out more one of the Vietnamese translators, Mr. Nguyen Ngoc Hai, was interviewed about why they thought it worthwhile to make the book, about planning in a far-away northern sea, available also to Vietnamese readers.
