The Office of Vestiges Management is one of three key offices of the National Cultural Heritage Department of the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism.

Vestiges management has an interdisciplinary relationship with a variety of other agencies, ministries and sectors, including the Ministry of Construction, the Ministry of Finance and the General Department of Tourism. In recent years the Office of Vestiges Management has protected and promoted many examples of cultural heritage through activities such as research, restoration, repair, excavation, recovery and protection. The office has an enthusiastic staff and has received the support of many leading academic staff and technical experts in diverse areas.

Up to now the Office has approved about 3,000 relics which achieve level of national standard; established and submitted five nominations for recognition by by UNESCO as world heritage sites (Hội An Old Town, Mỹ Sơn, Hạ Long Bay, Huế Historic Monuments and Phong Nha-Kẻ Bàng National Park), promulgated many legal documents relating to area of relics management.

The responsibilities of the Office include: (i) preparing proposals for the Minister to submit to Prime Minister for decisions on ranking and cancellation of ranking of specific national relics and decisions to propose to the UNESCO nomination of Vietnamese relics for consideration as world heritage; (ii) appraising and submitting to the Minister proposals for preservation, repair and restoration of national relics, special national relics and projects of reconstruction, as well as building constructions outside the area of national relic and specific national relic preservation considered to have a possible negative effect on relics pursuant to the regulation of legislation; (iii) appraising and submitting to the Minister recommendations for classification and cancellation of national relic rankings; (iv) directing the activity of preservation and promotion of historical and cultural relics of value and beauty spots; (v) appraising proposals for the repair and restoration of national relics, including preservation design and technique; (vi) appraising and submitting to the Minister recommendations for authorising the delivery of relics, antiques and national precious objects and overseeing their implementation; (vii) preparing and submitting to the Minister procedural regulations and application forms relating to relics, antiques and national precious objects and overseeing their implementation; (viii) submitting to the Minister proposals for regulating conditions of sale and ownership of relics, antiques and national precious objects and overseeing their implementation; (ix) making recommendations to the Standing National Council with regard to the appraisal of relics, antiques and national precious objects; and (x) preparing instructions on the use of professional skills for the Appraisal Council.

Recent activities in the field of international co-operation including: (i) co-operating with the UNESCO Representative Office for Việt Nam in organising workshops and training on the themes of illicit trafficking of cultural property, heritage protection and excavation in underwater archeology; (ii) co-operating with the Japan International Co-operation Agency (JICA), Việt Nam in a project to repair traditional antique houses and old villages and a project to improve neighbouring areas of the Mỹ Sơn relics in the framework of Japanese Government’s fund-in-trust for Việt Nam; (iii) co-operating with the Lerici Foundation (Italy) and the UNESCO Principal Regional Office for Asia and the Pacific (PROAP) in project Preserving the Mỹ Sơn Cultural Heritage Site – training to apply international standards in the preservation of world cultural heritage in the Tower Group G of Mỹ Sơn; (iv) co-operating with the Saga Horizon Company (Malaysia) in the excavation of antique sinking boats in Cù Lao Chàm (Hội An); and (v) co-operating with the University of Freedom Bruxelles (Belgium) in a programme of awareness-raising, training and support for leaders of Việt Nam’s cultural agencies about marketing in the field of culture and fine arts.