Final Documentation of Chia Se Poverty Alleviation Programme, Phase I

‘Chia Se’ is a Sida-funded poverty alleviation programme that started in November 2003. With an overall budget of USD 43.5 million it is part of Vietnam’s Socio-Economic Development Plan (SEDP) for 2006-2010 and supports the thrust towards decentralisation by making poverty alleviation a bottom-up and demand-driven process in three Provinces of Ha Giang, Yen Bai and Quang Tri, using poverty reduction tools such as Local Development Fund (LDF) and Local Planning for Management and Development (LPMD).

As Chia Se was coming to an end, a second phase was under planning that would concentrate on mainstreaming lessons learned from Chia Se Phase I into the overall policy context for rural development in Vietnam. Any mainstreaming efforts would thereby need to be based on verified information. The Chia Se Programme Secretariat therefore embarked on an ambitious process in order to substantiate the results from Chia Se Phase 1. Besides, there are also contractual obligations for the Ministry of Planning and Investment (MPI) and the three Chia Se provinces to document results and lessons learned.

The final documentation thus required was:

• Results Analysis report covering 2003-2009
• Completion reports from the Provinces to be delivered to MPI, covering 2003-2009
• Annual report covering 2008 up to the end of March 2009.

In addition, a special documentation of ‘lessons learned’ based on a long, participatory process from the villages and up, was needed. There was also a need to present the content of the above reports in a way that made them attractive to a wider audience than the immediate Chia Se stakeholders.