The Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment and international partners have agreed to restart the International Support Group on Natural Resources and Environment (ISGE) in a meeting in Hanoi. Accordingly, a larger scale program will be kicked off under the name of Natural Resources and Environment Policy Dialogue (NREPD). The agreement was reached during the November 24 meeting to assess the outcomes of the 2014 joint action plan within the framework of the 2013 Vietnam Development Partnership Forum (VDPF). Addressing the event, Do Nam Thang, deputy head of the ministry’s International Cooperation Department, said the ministry and development partners have carried out a number of actions to enhance the state management capacity in implementing laws on environment and to stepping up the community’s involvement in environmental protection. The 2014-2015 joint action plan was set up with a focus on implementing the support program to respond to climate change (SP- RCC) in Vietnam, revising documents guiding the implementation of the Law on Environment Protection, and increasing the national capacity on the evaluation of the environmental impacts as well as on building and participating in international and regional agreements related to environment. Established in 2009 to support the national target program to respond to the climate change, the SP-RCC has drawn the involvement of ministries, agencies and localities as well as international support such as the Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA), French Development Agency (AFD) and Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA). Apart from financial assistance, SP-PCC donors have coordinated with Vietnamese ministries have built up over 200 policy actions in response to climate change. A post-2015 action plan will be set up in next June. (Vietnam News Nov 25)
