East Asia

We have maintained a presence in the East Asia region since 1997. The majority of our work in the region traditionally falls into our Natural Resource Management Portfolio.  We are increasingly engaging in social development and governance activities and some of our most recent work includes food security in Laos, post tsunami livelihoods in Indonesia and evidence based policy advocacy and public financial reform in Vietnam.

We have a strong track record for implementing large scale, long-term in-situ projects and work with a variety of multi-lateral and bilateral donors, government counterparts and NGOs throughout Vietnam and the surrounding region.  Our highly experienced in-house staff and associate consultants contribute to the company’s solid record of delivering world class consultancy services in policy development and implementation.

Examples of our recent and ongoing work in the region includes:

 

The Vietnam Conservation Fund: A new financing mechanism that provides small grants to initiate and improve management of Special-use Forests of high biodiversity value. These grants are being implemented to fill gaps not covered by Government funds and have incremental value in the achievement of conservation objectives.  Planning and implementation of these grants is supported by the Regional Technical Assistance (RTA) teams. The RTA team’s primary roles are to build the capacity of protected area Management Boards and associated communities as equal partners in the implementation of protected area conservation and management.  FRR Ltd is contracted as the Northern Vietnam RTA provider.

 

Capacity Building for Biodiversity Conservation (CBBC) in Vietnam: This attempts to tackle the crucial issue of improving the capacity of forest protection staff at central level through the development of a framework which will form the basis of a comprehensive training program for forest protection staff. A component of the framework will be further developed and piloted in two sites. The project will also place considerable emphasis on operationalising and ultimately institutionalising this training component. As such the CBBC project is linked to and forms part of a broader commitment by the Vietnamese government to improved forest law enforcement and management.

 

Public Financial Management Reform Project: Supervising the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development work in pilot provinces to develop a Medium-Term Expenditure Framework, MTEF. This seeks to help the government in implementing multi-year budget planning that is linked to performance goals and decentralised management methods within a macro-economic framework of responsible fiscal policy.

 

Review of World Vision’s Food for Work/Food for Asset Programmes: Working on a study to review the extent to which food for work/food for asset (FFW/FFA) programmes have contributed to livelihood security in World Vision programme areas in Africa and Asia. The study assessed the sustainability and appropriateness of FFW/FFA programmes in achieving livelihood security. Policy recommendations to World Vision will follow.

 In 2005 we established a regional office in Hanoi to facilitate our work in Vietnam, and more broadly throughout the Asia region.  We have four permanent staff members based in our East Asia office, as well as dedicated project support staff and consultants who are seconded to long-term regional projects.  We have recently moved to a new location in An Duong, conveniently located close to town and en route from the international airport.  Click here to view a location map of our office.