EU-SPS co-operation with Vietnam
EU-SPS co-operation with Vietnam
Focus: Facilitating the transfer of capacity development and training in SP from international consultants to Vietnamese training organisations. Assisting Vietnamese organisations in designing and delivering new SP training courses as well as supporting these organisations in developing and implementing sound business plans and developing partnership with local ministries in order to ensure the sustainability of the courses.
Background
As the result of intensive efforts of national partners led by Ministry of Labor and social affairs (MOLISA) and National Assembly’s Committee for Social Affairs and with support from different international partners especially UNDP, the Master Plan for Social Assistance Reform (MPSAR) has been formulated and submitted to the GOVN for approval. MPSAR promotes major reform actions to transform Viet Nam’s social assistance system towards a modern one that is based more on life cycle and inclusive, right-based, approaches aiming at providing higher level of benefits for larger groups of vulnerable people in the Middle Income Viet Nam.
Focus of work
Together with UNDP, EU-SPS organized in 2016 a social protection training course that was delivered by the Economic Policy Research Institute (EPRI). The modules for the training course included a one-day module targeting National Assembly’s Social Affair Committee members, Party officials and policy makers from MOLISA, Ministry of Finance, Ministry of Planning and Investment as well as other ministries who are engaged in formulating and endorsing social assistance legal and policy frameworks. Further a 5 day module targeting technical staff of MOLISA, Institute for Labor Science and Social Affairs (ILSSA) as well as staff from relevant ministries and provinces who were responsible and engaged in designing, formulating, guiding the implementation and monitoring Social Assistance policies.
Vietnamese partners acknowledged that the training course has contributed substantially to policy advocacy for reforming social assistance system in Viet Nam and formulation of MPSAR, especially in terms of building the common knowledge of modern social assistance systems, and consensus on the needs for reform, as well as providing the analytical tools needed for defining the reform directions and actions in Viet Nam.
National partners, the EU-SPS Programme and UNDP Viet Nam recognize the need to institutionalize the training course, within Viet Nam’s institutions, as the most sustainable way to build national training capacity to support modernizing social assistance system in Viet Nam. Based on an organizational assessment and wide consultations it has been agreed that during 2017 and 2018 EU-SPS and UNDP will work jointly with Social Protection Department of MOLISA to facilitate a process through which the current training modules will be institutionalized in the following three organisations: The Institute for Labor Science and Social Affairs (ILSSA), The Institute of Labor and Social Affairs Training (ILSAT) and the Institute for Public Policy and Management. During 2017 the three Vietnamese organisations will deliver the courses jointly with an international consultant. From 2018 onwards the courses will be delivered by Vietnamese organisations only.
These three organisations will also jointly design and deliver a new practitioners training course that targets the regional staff of the Ministry of Labor and Social Affairs that are in charge of implementing and monitoring the new Social Protection policies. During the institutionalization process training of trainers (ToT) courses will be organized. The selected Vietnamese training organisations will be also assisted in developing and implementing sound business plans, partnership and resource mobilization strategies to make the SP courses sustainable.
