VIET NAM GREEN GENERATION FOR A GREEN GLOBE PROPOSAL SUMMARY 1. Project Title: ‘Vietnam Green Generation for a Green Globe’ 2. Project Site: Vietnam 3. Proponent: Raising Awareness on Environment and Climate Change Program 4. Project Objective: To improve the knowledge on environment and establish a sustainable life style for Vietnamese youth 5. Cooperating Organizations: • SMAX • Live & Learn • US – Vietnam Trade Council 6. Start-Up Date: December 2008 7. Project Period: 2 years 8. Total Project Cost: 44,561 USD 9. Brief Project Description: The project’s goal is to educate Vietnamese youth on environment protection and to improve the contribution of Vietnamese youth on the fight with climate change and environment pollutions by building a network of voluntary environmental clubs/organizations and other relevant bodies. The project would play the role of an intermediate proponent improving the connectivity between those environmental clubs. The establishment of a ‘green network’ would facilitate expanding the activities and the influences of environmental clubs and gather the resources for future development. I. RATIONALE 1. Climate Context: Climate change is, in the opinion of most scientists, inevitable. Indeed, the effects are probably being felt in many parts of the world, as average temperatures are rising and many areas are setting annual high temperature records. Vietnam is one of the most vulnerable countries in the world, threatened by rising sea levels, greater-intensity storms, floods and droughts and other effects of global warming. Changes in Temperature and Rainfall Between 1900 and 2000, annual average temperatures increased by 0.1°C per decade. Summers are becoming hotter with average summer month temperatures increasing by 0.1°C to 0.3°C per decade. It is expected that, compared to 1990, temperatures will increase in the range 1.4-1.5°C by 2050, and the highest temperature increases will be inland. Changes in rainfall patterns are complex and season and region specific. Monthly rainfall is already decreasing in most of the country in July and August and increasing in September, October and November, and rainfall intensity is increasing considerably. According to researches, compared to 1990, annual total rainfall is expected to increase in the range 2.5 percent to 4.8 percent by 2050. The increase will be largest in the north of Viet Nam and least in the southern plains. It is expected that rainfall will be concentrated, even more than now, in the rainy season months, leading to an exacerbation of drought problems in the dry season. Climate change, then, is set to make precipitation more uneven and variable over time and space. Floods and Drought Even before future climate change is factored in, Viet Nam is at risk from extreme weather events. In some areas, such as the central provinces and the Mekong River Delta, floods appear to be increasing in intensity compared with those in the first half of the 20th century, though whether this simply reflects increased human settlement, cultivation, and infrastructure development is unclear. Flood damage is expected to be aggravated by an increase in daily rainfall of 12-19 percent by 2070 in some areas, affecting both flood peak discharges and the return period of floods. Drought problems will intensify through increased variation in rainfall and increased evaporation triggered by rising temperatures. Typhoon Patterns The number of typhoons that Viet Nam experienced increased between the 1950s and the 1980s but subsequently decreased in the 1990s. The peak month of typhoon landfalls has shifted from August in the 1950s to November in the 1990s, and considerable uncertainty exists about the expected frequency of typhoons in the coming century. The trajectory of typhoons appears to have moved southwards in recent years though it is widely expected that due to a rise in temperatures, the north will become more subject to typhoon activity and the intensity of storms will increase, resulting in higher peak wind speeds and more intense precipitation. Coastal zones will suffer from more intense typhoons, posing higher threats to people’s lives, livelihoods, infrastructure and agricultural production. Upland communities will be faced with increasing risks of flash floods and landslides from heavy rainfall. An estimated 80-90 percent of Viet Nam’s population is potentially directly affected by typhoons. Sea Level Rise Several studies have reported sea level rise in Viet Nam. According to UNEP (1993) sea levels around Viet Nam increased by 5 cm between the 1960s and 1990s and the Hydro meteorological General Department estimates that the seawater level is raising at an average rate of 2 mm per year. Coastal erosion has also been reported, such as in the Ca Mau area where more than 600 hectares of land have been eroded, with 200m wide strips of land lost in some locations. Predictions for the extent of sea level rise in the future differ, with national publications asserting a rise of up to 1m by 2100. Sea level rise will overwhelmingly impact on the low-lying Mekong River Delta, which could be almost completely inundated for some periods of the year. Impacts on Agriculture A rise in seawater level will worsen saline water intrusion in coastal zones too, which is already a problem in some areas due to fresh water extraction for irrigation and drinking water and the construction of canals in the deltas and upstream dams. The Mekong River Delta will be the most affected region with 1.77 million ha of salinity land, accounting for 45 percent of the land. Inundation and the resulting loss of land, and saline water intrusion in the Mekong Delta and parts of the Red River Delta, the country’s most important agricultural areas, will pose serious threats to farmers as well as agricultural export products such as rice and possibly to national food security. Besides inundation, more frequent flooding, saline water intrusion, drought, and typhoons, both agriculture and natural ecosystems will suffer from increased minimum temperatures, a decreasing number of days with temperatures under 20°C and an increasing number of days with temperatures above 25°C. This will affect growing periods, crop calendars and crop distribution, increase pest and virus activity. This also causes a migration of tropical trees and crops northwards by 100-200 kilometers and to higher altitudes in the mountains by 100-550 meters where they will replace subtropical species. Some species may even extinct as a result of changing climatic conditions. Fisheries & Aquaculture Climate change is expected to have a considerable impact on Viet Nam’s fishery and aquaculture sectors, which accounted for 3.9 percent of GDP in 2005. The numbers of tropical fish with a low commercial value (except for tuna) would increase and the numbers of sub-tropical fish with a higher commercial value would decrease. Coral reefs are expected to degenerate and fish living in these habitats are expected to disappear. Moreover, sharp decreases in plankton would lead to migration of fish and reductions in fish body mass. As a result, it is estimated that the economic sea production capacity of Viet Nam would be reduced by at least one third. Due to a rise in seawater level, aquaculture farms will have to be relocated and saline water intrusion and reduction of the mangrove area will create loss of habitat for fresh water creatures. At last, increased rainfall intensity might temporarily reduce the salt concentration of seawater, affecting some species such as dual crust mollusks, living in coastal areas. Climate Change and Human Health Climate change is also expected to affect people’s health as increasing temperatures facilitate the growth and development of various viruses and disease carriers, resulting in higher incidence of infectious diseases such as malaria and dengue. Extreme weather and increased frequency and/or intensity of natural disasters, such as typhoons and floods, will threaten people’s lives and may lead to more fatalities, if significant mitigation and adaptation measures are not put in place. 2. Community Context One of the main causes for the heavily polluted environment in Vietnam is the lack of awareness of local citizens. Although Vietnamese citizens have superficial knowledge on the climate change and environmental issues through mass media, most of them think that this problem is irrelevant to their lives and the Government is responsible for solving it. This mindset leads to the inconsiderate actions and habits in daily lives. The eagerly participant of local residents in environmental event such as Earth Hour does show their awareness of the problems. However, these events are only action-oriented, thus barely have any influences in local residents’ life styles. This situation shows the need of educational programs which can help affecting the mental model of people and create a sustainable lifestyle for residents. 3. Overview of Environmental voluntary clubs and non-governmental organizations a. Government and Non-Governmental Organizations The Vietnamese government and donors are increasingly concerned by climate change and a variety of actions and institutions are underway, including some national working groups and a National Target Program. The NGO community has a role to play in helping to develop, advocate for and implement plans to help Vietnam in its response to climate change. Many NGOs are engaging with climate change in a variety of ways and many are seeking information to develop their organizational strategy and position in relation to climate change issues. The NGO 'Climate Change Working Group' (CCWG) was established in February 2008 in recognition of the fact that Vietnam is likely to be significantly affected by climate change and that NGOs are well placed to support localized responses. CCWG provides a forum for Vietnamese NGOs (VNGOs) and International NGOs (INGOs) to actively participate in the climate change debate. This group plays a significant role in facilitating information and resource-sharing and coordination among NGOs currently engaged in addressing climate change across a number of sectors and themes. Current core members include the NGO Resource Centre, Oxfam, CARE, Catholic Relief Service, World Wildlife Fund, SNV, East Meets West, etc. b. Voluntary Clubs and Groups A large number of volunteers groups have emerged in big cities of Vietnam in recent years. In which, more than 10 environmental volunteer clubs established in big cities: Green Action Vietnam, Cycle for Environment, Green Vietnam, Environment 360, Talking Green, Go Green, 3R, Motivation (Nhiet Huyet), Green Generation Network, and Environmental clubs in several universities and high schools and online groups, etc. On March 15th, 2009, a Memory of Understanding among nine regional environmental clubs has taken place in Hanoi. Several groups are founded by visionary young individuals, founding members of these clubs are young people personally touched by the urgency of the environmental protection or degradation of their living environment. Some established a club after participating an event organized by an environmental NGO, some went to abroad on a workshop that changed their thinking and some just read about environmental problems through the internet or newspaper. Web pages and blogs are now used to share information and bring the groups together. Over thousand young people and older members of the community have participated to some of the activities ranging from promotion of cycling, cleaning of the city, signing a petition for environment, organizing a fair for recycling, creating community art or just joining to English talking clubs that discuss and debate on environmental issues and share information. Many of them are under concern about the human behavior and system change towards sustainable practices in Vietnamese society, without realization how and when, through participating in their civic group, they have changed themselves positively and differently from their previous state of sustainability illiteracy. These young people are green generation who care and are eager to apply sustainable lifestyles. c. The inefficiency However, all clubs and organizations are still acting separately. Activities overlap one another, clubs waste manpower, and there is a huge lack in professionalism as well as in co- operation. Clubs have difficulties in finding sponsors, project managers and appropriate ways to develop manpower. In both the viewpoint of the government and that of the non- government organizations, voluntary activities haven’t built any prestige as most activities are short-term, low-effective, concentrating on only one specific action but missing general educational purposes. Some activities of 3R or GoGreen, though take education into account, however, conduct in only a few schools. The content of these activities is either too general or too specific as most are not well-prepared, and lack in serious results’ evaluation. II. GOALS AND APROACHES From this situation, we need to: • Enhance the professionalism of voluntary environment clubs • Reinforce co-operation among clubs • Expand activities to gain knowledge about Environment as well as to improve efficiency of previous activities Project Approach • Set up an Environment and Climate Change Club which concentrates on environment- related activities. • Establish a network of environmental clubs in schools and companies in Hanoi. • Build a framework in which regional and national clubs can co-operate. How the project solves the problem • A network will help organizations to share human resources as well as combine their advantages. To boot, a network helps avoid overlapping activities as well as competing for ideas. Moreover, activities involving many participating organizations are of a larger scale, and thus more effective and have a greater influence upon the society. To call for human resources, a network connects not only environmental clubs, but also other helpful organizations such as the Y&Y, Student Union, etc. Besides, a large-scale research will be carried out due to a great demand to gain knowledge on habits and awareness of residents on Climate Change. The first website on Climate Change with a friendly interface will soon be established in order to provide people with general knowledge as well as to call for participation from everyone, especially the youth. To sum up, these activities do not only fill in the gap that exists in the current situation, but also creates a chance for all clubs to co-operate and get to know each other. • Opening courses and setting up programs to enhance skills will help clubs’ projects to become more effective and more professional. Each club has their own distinguished strength, but weakness in the organization, management, and in building long-term strategies still remains. These courses should develop leaders’ capability as well as enforce co-operation and relationship among organizations and clubs. Furthermore, experts from NGOs and INGOs will share their experience, and consult clubs to reinforce their own system, and form their own plans. As a consequence, clubs’ activities will flow more smoothly and efficiently. • Establishing an organization which specializes in environment education will solve the problem of lacking knowledge in this field. The campaign also suggests a plan to set up environment clubs in companies, clubs which will enlarge the number of people participating in the project. III. PROPONENT DESCRIPTION Raising Awareness on Environment and Climate Change Program (RAECP), founded in December 2008, is an organization of young people. We try our best to be a professional voluntary organization on Environment and Climate Change Smax is a club of people who want to improve their soft skills. This club’s members are students in many courses of Tam Viet Group, a famous Education Center of Vietnam. Smax’s members are experienced on training, event–making and capacity-enhancement. Live & learn is an NGO specializing in community participatory education to promote sustainable livelihood development and conservation of environmental resources in some of the most vulnerable communities and biologically diverse regions in Asia and the South Pacific. The U.S Vietnam Trade Council (USVTC) and its educational affiliate, the U.S Vietnam Trade Council Education Forum (USVTC-EF), have played leadership role in building the relationship between the U.S. and Vietnam, contributing to the normalization of the relations between the two countries and the improvement of the bilateral trade and the investment in environment. The USVTC has played a key role in the negotiation and implementation of the U.S Vietnam Bilateral Trade Agreement (BTA) and Vietnam's accession to the World Trade Organization (WTO) and will continue to work closely with Vietnam on the next steps in Vietnam's economic integration and development. IV. PROJECT DESCRIPTION 1. Subproject 1 1.1. Project Title: “Being knowledgeable to change the world”. 1.2. Project Site: Hanoi 1.3. Project Period: 2 years 1.4. Total Project Cost: 19,190.6 USD 1.5. Backgrounds: Vietnamese people consider climate change a new issue and pay very inadequate attentions from local community in general. However, recently, Vietnamese media has gradually paid more attention to this phenomenon judging by the fact that a lot of information about environment and climate change are now widely spread. Hence, local communities are better warned of the climate change when extreme weather happens. Also, local community has also acquired more knowledge on this problem through several big events held in Viet Nam such as Earth Hour Campaign in which 1,1 million people in 5 big cities (Hanoi, Hue, Ho Chi Minh City, Hoi An, [...]... Ha Noi, Viet Nam Schaefer, D (2003) Recent Climate Changes And Possible Impacts On Agriculture In Viet Nam with Regard to the Red River Delta Department of Geography, Working Group on Climatology, Mainz University Germany (Presentation) Raksakulthai, V (2002) Climate Change Impacts and Adaptation Options in Viet Nam Asian Disaster Preparedness Centre UNDP- Community-Based Adaptation to Climate Change... responsible for the following parts: (At least 2 managers for each part and 1 manager may undertake many parts) 1 Coordinator: including allocating human resources, assigning tasks, developing orientation, checking problems and demands of program Coordinators have the main roles in assigning works among groups and individuals as well as allocating human resources (in both terms of finance and manpower) They also... Change Program The management board consists of a program director, some program managers and specialized staffs who are grouped as the team “Fight for the Future” (abbreviated as the F3 Team) Program director has the same responsibilities as a general manager of the program Program director takes charge of the program and is the highest representative of the program (admin@raecp.org) Managers: are... regulations; Creating financial management; Making reports and evaluating members, giving feedbacks; Working as consultants or assistances in establishing projects, clubs in different organizations; Making cooperation and administration regulations Specialized staffs: are responsible for the specialized tasks such as translating, editing, information technology or training • Translating • Environment and... information and technology, foreign languages and up-to-date knowledge On one hand, many volunteers groups are mushrooming to show their concern and care for social and environmental issues In the other hand, the populous generation of Vietnam faces ecological literacy challenges as the whole country is struggling toward its socio-economic growth Many Vietnamese see climate change issues as abstract and too... investigating members’ biographies, classifying their abilities, taking their ideas, aspirations, developing new members network, building new managing mechanism and being in charge of internal affairs Human resources managers work directly with all members They are those who understand members’ abilities, ambition, enthusiasm and contributing capacities These managers also arrange managing mechanism, and... updating the list of members with their exact addresses 3 Public Relations: PR, promoting, construction updates and reports, news Issues of cooperation, assistance The work requires the managers regularly update the information in and outside the organization Any information from any source can be useful, necessary for organizations as well as for members and volunteer activities in general For example,... Development, Hanoi Hoang, Duc Cuong Tran, Viet Lien (2006) Developing various climate change scenarios of 21 century for regions of Viet Nam, Scientific and Technical Hydro-Meteorological Journal No 541, January 2006 IPCC (2007) 4th Assessment Report Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change MoNRE, (2003) Viet Nam Initial National Communication Under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change... responsibility of Vietnamese youngsters” and shaping the youth’s attitudes towards dealing with pollution and climate change • Assisting voluntary clubs to apply knowledge of environment and climate change to volunteer clubs’ activities as well as making a plan to share with others • Promoting and encouraging ideas of building up green behaviors in students’ lives and activities as well as in volunteer... a major productive stakeholder and have fresh and innovative ideas, who are eager about bringing movement and change Thus, there are special opportunities to involve youth in sustainable development The Youth is not only the objective of the programs but also the factors that create the changes leading to development Vietnamese youths are becoming increasingly equipped with globally-updated information . VIET NAM GREEN GENERATION FOR A GREEN GLOBE PROPOSAL SUMMARY 1. Project Title: ‘Vietnam Green Generation for a Green Globe 2. Project Site: Vietnam. estimates that the seawater level is raising at an average rate of 2 mm per year. Coastal erosion has also been reported, such as in the Ca Mau area where