Budget: From 1/2007 to 12/2009 - CHF 1'300'000 (approx. US$ 1'000'000)

Line Agency: Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development

Partners/Beneficiaries: Nineteen departments  and two centres of MARD and DARD.

Implementing Agency: Department of Planning - Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development

Project Location: Hanoi – Vietnam

Background:

Government of Vietnam (GOV) has formulated and implemented the Comprehensive Poverty Reduction and Growth Strategy since 2002. Agriculture and rural development forces have played an important role in poverty reduction. SDC therefore has shown its interest in financing MARD through a project aimed at improving the monitoring of implementation of agriculture and rural development plans in combination with CPRGS and the national Socio-economic Development Plan.

Improvements in monitoring and evaluation (M&E) activities are needed to support further reforms in planning, policy making and sector management, especially in the transition to a market economy and exposure to increasing global competition. The MESMARD project is one important step toward enhancing management and strengthening strategy and policy of MARD.

Overall Goal:

Contribute to broad-based growth and qualitative poverty reduction through improved formulation and implementation of agricultural and rural development policies, plans and programmes.

Current Objectives:

• Strengthen the awareness, understanding and capacity in planning and M&E of the agricultural and rural development sector's planners and policy makers.
• Establish and operate a pilot system in monitoring and evaluating the implementation of 2006 - 2010 Five Year Plan in agricultural and rural sector.
• From these pilot outcomes, design a comprehensive and   integrated M&E system to cover the whole agricultural and rural sector and serve as an integral part of the national M&E system, including the M&E of SEDP/MDGs.

Approaches:

The project chooses the open and flexible implementation approach. This specifically means it will allow flexible changes, adjustments and fine tuning of activities and implementation strategies along the process as experiences are learnt, as long as there is progress towards the objectives.

Experiences and the process of piloting various activities will be documented to justify any adjustments. Close dialogue and consultations between MARD, the donors and project managers will be held to ensure the projects goes in the right direction reaching the intended results.

Most important, the project will take in useful lessons from several recent and ongoing projects which are contributing to GOV reform, results-based management and improved monitoring, supervision and accountability.

Results Achieved and Expected:

• Enhanced capacity in formulating and evaluating plans and policies in a revised, market-responsive planning and reporting system applied at all levels.
• M&E systems reviewed, framework established, M&E system designed, implemented, tested, refined and applied in all Departments and pilot provinces.
• Proposals presented to upgrade and apply Monitoring and Evaluation of Policy Planning system in whole sector, integrated with the national system in SEDP-MDG framework.

Highlights:

Project adjusted its original design to take in MARD request for the renovation of planning - as realized in templates of 5 year Sector Plan and subsector plans.

Information and Publications:

Refer to the website of Department of Planning - MARD at: http://vukehoach.mard.gov.vn

Contact:

Project Management Unit - Department of Planning
Trang Hieu Dung, Director
Room No. 309, A10 Building
Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development
No.2 Ngoc Ha, Ba Dinh, Hanoi

Tel: +84 4 7346224
Fax: +84 4 8432654
Email: mesmard@gmail.com