HANOI, Jan. 9 (Xinhua) -- China's initiatives and activeness have contributed to boosting practical cooperation in the Lancang-Mekong framework, a Vietnamese scholar has said.

Vietnam welcomes and highly appreciates the initiatives and goodwill cooperation of China, not only in the bilateral framework but also in the Lancang-Mekong River Cooperation (LMC) and ASEAN-China frameworks, Tran Viet Thai, deputy general director of the Institute for Foreign Strategic Studies at the Diplomatic Academy of Vietnam, told Xinhua on Sunday.

At a recent meeting in the Chinese province of Yunnan, China proposed to help downstream Mekong countries improve their management and regulation capacity.

"This will create conditions for the countries to better manage Mekong water resources in their territories," Thai commented.

Under the current LMC framework, cooperation on water resources is one of five focal cooperation fields.

Besides water resources, the LMC framework has cooperation fields such as connectivity, production capacity, agriculture and poverty reduction.

"Projects in the early harvest list have made positive achievements, and made important contributions to cooperation between ASEAN and China," Thai stated.

The Lancang River originates on the Qinghai-Tibet plateau in southwest China. It is called the Mekong River as it flows through Myanmar, Laos, Thailand, Cambodia and Vietnam before emptying into the sea.