Communication Adviser to the Chia Se Programme

Chia Se, which stands for ‘partnership’ in Vietnamese, is a Sida-funded poverty alleviation programme that started in November 2003 and is planned to run until the end of 2008. 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).
In the period from July 2005 to August 2006, an international communication advisor was stationed at the Secretariat of Chia Se Program. The advisor developed a good foundation for Chia Se communication that could facilitate smooth flow of information exchange within Chia Se and between Chia Se and other parties, including national, international agencies and the wide public. An Outline of Communication Platform for Chia Se Program was also designed by the advisor for follow-up activities in the field of communication and information exchange. This assignment is a profundization of the results achieved and the general objective of the advisor’s work is hence to improve the quality of Chia Se external communication, making sure that the program’s experience, lessons learnt and achievements reach the government agencies in charge of formulating poverty reduction policies, international and national development organisations, local autorities and the public.

The initial assignments objective of the advisor was to improve the quality of Chia Se’s external communication, making sure that the programme’s experiences, lessons learnt and achievements reached the government agencies in charge of formulating poverty reduction policies, international and national development organisations, local autorities and the public.

During the follow-up assignment in January-February 2008, the Communications Adviser developed a plan for Chia Se Phasing Over Communication. This included a transcript for a video and outlines for a photobook about the Chia Se programme and work-plans for these two products.

The CA returned for a third assignment in November 2008. The main issues were to revise the Phasing Over Communication Plan, develop and implement a process for collecting lessons learned and results from Chia Se communication and to document these lessons learned and results for the overall programme Result Analysis report.