HANOI, February 2, 2015 - The U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) and Vietnam’s Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development (MARD) have signed a memorandum of understanding to strengthen disaster response management. By building capacity at MARD to implement what is called an Incident Command System (ICS), USAID supports Vietnam’s efforts to continuously improve response and coordination systems to more effectively respond to all kinds of incidents and disasters.

“The ICS training program will be an important step towards helping Vietnam address the disaster risks brought about by a changing climate,” said Deputy Assistant Administrator for Asia, Jason Foley, who is visiting Vietnam from Washington, DC. “The U.S. believes that adoption and localization of the internationally-proven ICS system will both strengthen coordination systems and better prepare Vietnam to work more closely with its ASEAN partners on disaster response.” Mr. Foley and the Minister of MARD signed the MOU covering this assistance.

USAID has a long partnership with Vietnam in the area of disaster prevention, preparedness, and response, providing over $10 million in support on natural disaster management since 2001.  Currently the USAID has a number of disaster risk reduction projects on early warning decision-making tools, community-based disaster risk reduction, and public-private partnerships on disaster risk management underway.

Photos from the MOU signing can be seen here: https://flic.kr/s/aHsk7sH8Uq.