Overdue Update from Oz

For shame! I returned to Australia in mid-February from my 3 month internship with Roots of Peace Vietnam (awesome!), and this is the first post I've managed since. I have a good excuse, though: it's the final semester of my Peace Fellowship and Master's in International Studies, Peace & Conflict Resolution. Things are very busy in Oz, to say the least.

Needless to say, I don't have time to write a unique and original post at this point. Rather than abandon this blog, however, I thought I'd share with you the report from my internship (or Applied Field Experience) in Vietnam. Enjoy!

Summer Lewis

Roots of Peace Applied Field Experience (AFE) Logbook

November 2011 – February 2012

Vietnam

   

AFE BACKGROUND INFORMATION

Host Organization: Roots of Peace

Roots of Peace (ROP) is a humanitarian organization dedicated to eradicating landmines worldwide and rehabilitating land and livelihoods. ROP is a 501(c)(3) registered U.S. non-profit organization. ROP projects are located in Afghanistan, Vietnam, Israel/West Bank, Croatia, Kyrgyz Republic, Iraq, Angola, and Cambodia.

Roots of Peace mission statement:

·    “The mission of Roots of Peace is to demine, replant and rebuild post-conflict countries. We work to rid the world of landmines and other remnants of war by transforming toxic minefields into thriving farmland and communities.” (http://www.rootsofpeace.org/programs/countries/)

Background on ROP Vietnam

ROP started working in Vietnam in 2009 with the launch of the “Sustainable Horticulture and Agriculture Development Pilot (SHADE) Project that will focus on working with over 1,100 farmers in the cacao, coffee, bamboo, pepper and eel value chains in Bình Phước and Quảng Trị Provinces.” (http://www.rootsofpeace.org/programs/countries/vietnam/index.html) ROP Vietnam seeks to work with existing institutions and therefore involves the Vietnamese government's agriculture department in their work in order to reach as many farmers as possible and provide agricultural training and assistance. ROP Vietnam’s funding comes primarily from private individuals, with some money from ROP.

ROP Vietnam has three offices and nine staff members. The American Country Director divides his time between the three offices:

1. Ho Chi Minh City

Administrative office with 2 accountants

2. Đồng Xoài, Bình Phước Province (2 ½ hours north of Ho Chi Minh City by car)

Cacao project office with Project Manager, 2 Extension Advisors, and Driver

ROP Binh Phuoc staff (left to right): Mr. Tucker Kuhn (Country Director), Nguyễn Thị Mơ (Extension Advisor), Mr Vi Van Son (Senior Extension Advisor), Summer Lewis (Intern), and Nguyễn Quang Ngân (Project Manager)

3. Dong Ha, Quảng Trị Province (Central Vietnam, on the DMZ)

Black pepper project office with Project Manager and Extension Advisor

ROP Quang Tri staff (left to right): Nguyễn Quang Ngân (Project Manager), Vo Thi Lien (Extension Advisor), Summer Lewis (Intern), and Nguyễn Thanh Binh (Provincial Coordinator)

I spent the majority of my time in Ho Chi Minh City and visited the Bình Phước and Quảng Trị offices multiple times.

Background on Cacao

Around 2004, the Vietnamese government started promoting cacao production in southern Vietnam. This was in response to increasing demand by international chocolate traders and processors for a more stable source of cacao. Since 2004, alliances have been formed between international NGOs, agribusiness, and chocolate companies in an attempt to increase cacao production and quality in Vietnam. However, in certain areas, some of these projects have shown lackluster results and current production is lower than projected.

Cacao pod

ROP started working in Bình Phước Province, a major producer of cashews, in 2009. Cashew farmers can increase their incomes with cacao tress, which grow well under the shade of cashew trees. ROP Vietnam works with the government’s AAEC (Agriculture Aquaculture Extension Committee), the agency responsible for agricultural extension work, to provide effective training for government agents and, by extension, farmers. ROP Vietnam provides subsidized cacao seedlings and fertilizer (farmer pays 40%) and extension services to 844 farmers. The Country Director of ROP Vietnam ultimately wants to incorporate international traders into the project to ensure its longevity and efficacy.

Background on Black Pepper

ROP Vietnam started working in Quảng Trị Province in 2009 to help improve farmers’ incomes through black pepper, a crop that doesn’t take up a great amount of space, can easily be intercropped with other produce, and fetches a good price on the market. ROP Vietnam offers a package to new and existing black pepper farmers, including cuttings, poles, and fertilizer; farmers pay 50% of total project input costs. ROP extension training is offered to farmers, including advice on orchard and irrigation layout and training for planting, fertilizer use, orchard care, harvesting, and marketing.

Black pepper vine

AFE RESPONSIBILITIES

Role in the Organization

I served as a Roots of Peace Intern and reported to the ROP Vietnam Country Director, Mr. Tucker Kuhn.

Start date and end date of AFE period

November 14, 2011 – February 14, 2012

Working Hours

Office staff generally work from 9:00 am – 6:00 pm Monday-Friday in Ho Chi Minh City and 8:00 am – 5:00 pm at the Bình Phước and Quảng Trị project offices. However, a significant portion of work in the Bình Phước and Quảng Trị projects consists of extension work—visiting farmers in the field to carry out M & E (Monitoring and Evaluation), meeting with government officials, etc.—thus schedules vary on a weekly basis.

I worked directly with Mr. Tucker Kuhn and accompanied him to meetings, field visits, and networking gatherings. Thus my schedule mirrored his, and generally aligned with the Ho Chi Minh City, Bình Phước, and Quảng Trị Province office hours.

Objectives/ Terms of Reference

I was assigned the following tasks for my internship by the ROP Vietnam Country Director:

1.  Support Extension staff in field visits and reporting

2.  Work with ROP Program staff to update website reports/articles

3.  Identify compelling farmer stories to highlight for website/donor reports

4.  Assist ROP Program staff in editing program documents/reports

5.  Identify potential donors for expansion of work in Vietnam

6.  Work with Home Office to support online shop in relation to Vietnamese goods

7.  Identify project areas where ROP can directly target activities to support women

8.  Work with project partners to establish a cacao conference

Carrying Out Assigned Tasks

1.  Support Extension staff in field visits and reporting

·    Accompanied ROP Extension staff as they carried out M & E (Monitoring and Evaluation) in Bình Phước and Quảng Trị Provinces and photographed visits

On these trips, ROP Extension Agents and Government Agricultural Extension Agents would drive out into the country, meet with farmers in their fields, record plant survival rates, offer suggestions on plant maintenance (pruning, irrigation, fertilizer application), and answer any questions. 

·    Attended a ROP Vietnam TOT (“Training of the Trainer”) in Quảng Trị where a black pepper expert teaches club leaders, model farmers, and demo farmers how to train other farmers in agricultural “best practices.”

·    Photographed field visits

·    Visited another NGO’s cacao project with ROP staff members and compared project structure, goals, and effectiveness

·    Helped improve the English skills of staff members through conversation and informal English language instruction

ROP Staff Extension Advisor, Lien, explaining black pepper diseases

2.  Work with ROP Program staff to update website reports/articles

·    Provided photographs to ROP staff in the U.S. compiling the Annual Report

·    Created blog during my time in Vietnam, created posts about ROP’s work and my internship, shared posts on the ROP Facebook page

·    Instructed ROP Bình Phước staff in uploading photos to the ROP facebook page and composing photo descriptions

·    Wrote updates for Rotary Clubs in the U.S. and Australia with information on ROP Vietnam, my internship, and my Country Director, a Rotarian from San Francisco

3.  Identify compelling farmer stories to highlight for website/donor reports

·    Brainstormed marketing and fundraising ideas with Tucker

·    Drafted questionnaire for cacao farmers that ROP Extension staff will use to evaluate project benefits to families (especially education); information may also be used to market the ROP Vietnam project to donors

·    Helped connect ROP Vietnam Country Director to a Vietnamese-American student, Pang Her, in Public Relations at Kansas State University (my alma mater) to serve as a marketing consultant for ROP Vietnam

Maintained contact with Pang, providing her background information on ROP Vietnam via email and Skype; looked over her research on a new ROP Vietnam website (layout, general appearance, photos, effectiveness) and farmer questionnaire

·    Arranged for Katrina Lewis, Assistant Professor in Interior Architecture and Product Design at Kansas State University and Rotary Peace Scholar at Chulalongkorn, Thailand, to photograph farmers and ROP Projects

4.  Assist ROP Program staff in editing program documents/reports

·    Designed brochure with information on ROP, ROP Vietnam projects, and photographs; worked with ROP Vietnam Country Director, ROP CEO and Founder, and ROP Executive Director to edit the document; researched copyrighting/trademarking a quote in the brochure

·    Read and summarized a 131-page report on safe pesticide use

The document, “2011 Afghanistan CHAMP PERSUAP Afghanistan Competitive Horticulture and Agriculture Marketing Project Pesticide Evaluation Report and Safe Use Action Plan,” was produced for an ROP project in Afghanistan. I distilled the report down to a little over a page by selecting information that would both summarize the document and could potentially apply to the ROP Vietnam projects.

·    Reviewed documents from an organization in East Timor that is working on an organic coffee project and is seeking a comparison project with ROP in Vietnam

5.  Identify potential donors for expansion of work in Vietnam

·    Researched and compiled a report on websites/tools that donors use to evaluate organizations, websites linking donors to organizations, and general fundraising websites of interest

·    Gained a better understanding of the “politics of aid” and issues related to public/private funding, governance, and bureaucracy

6.  Work with Home Office to support online shop in relation to Vietnamese goods

·    Tucker had initially proposed this task, owing to my background and experience working with a women’s textile cooperative in Guatemala. However, I expressed interest in focusing on cacao and black pepper value chains during my time in Vietnam, and Tucker adjusted my work accordingly.

7.  Identify project areas where ROP can directly target activities to support women

·    Since I have a background in Women’s Studies, Tucker proposed this task in my TOR. For the same reasons stated in point six, the opportunity to further address this task did not materialize. In retrospect, I observed that while women are expected to carry out household reproductive tasks, they also often farm alongside their husbands and assist with farming duties. We even encountered some women who were the primary cacao or black pepper farmers. Thus, I can say that it would be wise to consider existing research and gender-and-development models in order to create an effective means to directly target activities to support women.

8.  Work with project partners to establish a cacao conference

·    Attended the annual International Cocoa Conference in Bến Tre, Vietnam with two ROP Vietnam staff

Bến Tre is considered the most successful area of cacao production in Vietnam. The Conference consisted of four theme streams: Report on Cacao in Vietnam (by province), Production, Technical Aspects and Enhancing Quality. There were a number of NGOs, agribusiness, chocolate companies and government agriculture agencies present. 

·    Researched and compiled a report on commodity associations (types, formation, funding, and principles) and major cocoa and cashew traders, processors, and distributors in Vietnam and worldwide

Attending the International Cocoa Conference

In addition to the above assigned tasks, I:

·    Researched cacao and coffee production, certification schemes, agribusiness, and landmines in Vietnam; shared updates on developments in the cocoa world with ROP Vietnam Country Director

·    Networked with government officials with DOFA (Department of Foreign Affairs), DARD (Department of Agricultural and Rural Development), and AAEC (Agriculture Aquaculture Extension Committee) in Bình Phước and Quảng Trị Provinces

·    Established connections and met with the staff of various companies and NGOs in Vietnam and Cambodia, including:

·    A Manager with Olam Vietnam, one of the largest supply chain management companies worldwide dealing with agricultural products and food ingredients. They are the largest suppliers of cashews, sesame, robusta, and cacao worldwide, and one of the top 5 suppliers of Arabica coffee and work with various “socially responsible” certification programs.  (http://www.olamonline.com/aboutus/ourbusiness.asp)

·    An Operations Officer with IFC (International Finance Corporation, a member of the World Bank Group) Sustainable Business Advisory Services for the Mekong Region

·    A Regional Director for Mars Chocolate (http://www.mars.com/global/brands/chocolate.aspx)

·    A Regional Director of Sales for Yara International, the “number one global supplier of mineral fertilizers” (http://www.yara.com/about/index.aspx)

·    A Manager at Joma Bakery Café (Hanoi, Vietnam), a socially responsible business in Laos and Vietnam that is run in association with Hagar International, an “organization committed to the recovery, rehabilitation and community reintegration of women and children who have been victims of human rights abuse in Afghanistan, Cambodia, and Vietnam” (http://www.joma.biz/Joma/We_Care.html)

·    Staff at the Global Community Service Foundation, a U.S.-based NGO working “to eradicate poverty in Southeast Asia by implementing sustainable, community-based programs that focus on improving access to health care, education and income-generation activities” (http://globalcommunityservice.org/)

·    The Director of PeaceTrees, an NGO in Quảng Trị that removes landmines and UXOs (unexploded ordinances), offers survivor assistance, carries out mine risk education, helps build kindergartens and libraries, and offers microcredit (http://www.peacetreesvietnam.org/)

·    A Fair Trade expert/author familiar with the movement in South/South East Asia (and worldwide) who is interested in “localizing” fair trade

·    Staff at PEPY and PEPY Tours (Promoting Education, emPowering Youth), an international NGO registered in Cambodia and the US: “PEPY Tours offers responsible adventure travel options which fund educational programs throughout Cambodia”  (http://pepyride.org/)

·    Staff at the Global Initiative to Advance Entrepreneurship (GIVE), an NGO “dedicated to addressing the growing problem of global poverty in the developing world […] by forging complementary relationships between the for-profit and nonprofit sectors, and by linking proven models and resources to eventually alleviate global poverty” (http://givefoundationonline.org/)

·    Visited Kinyei, “an organization based in Battambang, Cambodia which supports social projects and grassroots enterprise with social media and its platforms for volunteer engagement”  (http://www.kinyei.org/)

·    Attended a Rotary Club meeting in Phnom Penh, Cambodia