Minute of the 2^nd General Meeting of VERN

The second general meeting of VERN was held at 27 Tran Xuan Soan, Hanoi on November 17, 2004, from 8.30 AM to 5 PM.

Participants in the meeting comprised of Dr. Evan Due from IDRC regional office in Singapore, two international advisors - Dr. John Cockburn and Dr. Remco Oostendorp, VERN project research leader - Dr. Nguyen Thang, all members of VERN project office, members of local technical assistance team, and almost all researchers of six sub-research groups.

This meeting aimed to give a chance to VERN researchers to present their new research results since the general meeting in Hue, methodological problems, difficult-to-interpret results and proposed steps to finalise their work. This meeting is the networking activity, which is an integral part of VERN.

The meeting was opened by a short introduction of Dr. Nguyen Thang and a speech of Dr. Evan Due. Following were presentations of all groups. The first presentation was made by group 26 led by La Hai Anh. Next was group 1 led by Dr. Bui Thi Tam. The presentation of group 23 led by Prof. Nguyen Thi Canh closed the morning session. Group 6 led by Dang Nhu Van opened the afternoon session. Next were presentations by group 9/34 and 13. As suggested by Dr. John Cockburn, there was at least one designated commentator for each paper from one of the other teams. As such, the network aspect of this project was developed. Therefore, after each presentation there were comments made by designated commentators and other participants. All the groups received the comments and responded to questions raised by the participants.

Throughout the meeting, there were some issues which were highlighted. First, all the groups were encouraged to exchange their ideas, methodology, and datasets. More specifically, the group 6 and group 23 should exchange their methodology concerning TFP calculation as well as simulation exercise; the group 13 should share the dofiles used for processing VLSSs datasets with the group 1. It was expected that the VERN office would continue providing technical supports to the groups. The issue of capacity building was mentioned throughout the meeting. In addition, the importance of translating research results into strong policy messages was stressed. Moreover, to control the quality of research outputs, Dr. John Cocburn asked all the groups to submit their raw datasets and dofiles to VERN office.

After presentations and discussion, Dr. Evan Due and Dr. Nguyen Thang thanked the groups for the work done so far. They also urged the groups to finalise their research work to meet the deadline. Moreover, they briefly mentioned the vision of VERN. The groups were encouraged to think about the focus area of the next phase of VERN. They were asked to provide their opinions in the next meeting. Then, the groups outside Hanoi that could not attend the meeting between VERN office and VERN group leaders on 2nd November spoke their thoughts on VERN activities. They highly appreciated the assistance of VERN office as well as technical supports of the international advisors. Following the comments received in this meeting as well as the advice of the international advisors, they would come to complete their papers. The meeting was closed by Dr. Nguyen Thang thanking all who participated in the meeting.

Date: November 17, 2004