Project Title – Empowering Survivors of Agent Orange in the Quang Binh ProvinceOrganization Name - Association for Empowerment of Persons with Disabilities (AEPD)Mailing Address - 40 Nguyen Dinh Chieu Street - Dong Hoi - Quang Binh – VietnamMain point of contact - Thanh Hong Nguyen (AEPD director) Email - thanhhongdh@gmail.comTotal Amount of USAID Funds Requested – $927,822Total Cost-Share Amount – $92,782.20 (10%)Proposed Sub-Partners’ Names and Award Amounts - Advocacy Project (AP) $46,391.10 (5%)Period of Program - 36 months

Brief Description of Project (up to 5 sentences): As one of the leading advocates for disability rights in Vietnam, the AEPD will implement a project that empowers and serves three generations of Vietnamese whose lives have been devastated by Agent Orange (AO)/dioxin while residing in Quang Binh – one of the poorest provinces in the country. Beyond the project’s aim to expand the technical capacities of caregivers and special education professionals, which work directly with the 10,000 disabled survivors of AO/dioxin exposure, the 2000 plus direct beneficiaries of the project will be offered a basket of P, O, and S therapy services that are organized under health and wellbeing, family income and economic participation, and education. The project will also broaden the compensation offered by the government to victims of AO, by enlarging the number of medical conditions that qualify for support. In conjunction with the Advocacy Project’s technical, financial, and in-kind support, many of the province-wide activities in this project will be executed by the AEPD’s distinguished peer support infrastructure, which functions in all 8 districts of Quang Binh, and includes highly qualified outreach-workers, who themselves are also a disabled person. One AEPD/AP survey of 500 AO survivors conducted in 2014, found that 141 survivors were women; therefore, gender will be integrated into the program at all stages, including the training of several health and education providers, many of which are women.

Main Impact Expected to be Achieved: 1. Health and Wellbeing: To improve the overall health and wellbeing of AO survivors by

expanding their accessibility to health care in rural communes and through the provision of physical, occupational, spiritual rehabilitation, and by facilitating social inclusion.

2. Household Income and Economic Participation: Increase family income and economic participation in AO-affected households through occupational therapy, seed/business startup funding, and by expanding the market for their income generating goods and services.

3. Education: To strengthen the capacity of rural communes, AO victims and their families, and healthcare and special education practitioners through additional speech/physical therapy education and training.

4. Advocacy: To increase the number of AO survivors that receive government subsidies by expanding the list of medical conditions linked to Agent Orange in Vietnam (17 conditions), in line with the most current medical literature and scholarship (24 conditions).

Main Results Set 1: A. PWDs have better access to speech therapy and physical rehabilitation.B. AO survivors are better able to participate in and perform daily living activities.C. Child AO survivors develop new friendships and improve their social skills.

D. Male and female AO survivors are introduced into a gender-specific, socially inclusive environment, allowing for their spiritual and emotional rehabilitation.

Main Results Set 2:A. Male and female heads of AO-affected households, and caregivers, acquire the technical

skills necessary to produce goods and launch entrepreneurial startups.B. Male and female heads of households and caregivers acquire the management skills

necessary to operate their own business.C. 255 individual entrepreneurial startups and 30 group startups (5-9 persons per group) are

launched. These will draw on AEPD’s successful business models, such as bee keeping, animal husbandry, blind massage therapy.

D. Consumers learn about these AO businesses, enabling the goods to be managed and sold at the provincial level.

E. Additional revenue for PWD household businesses, through an e-commerce platform.

Main Results Set 3:A. Rural communes have a better understanding of the medical conditions caused by AO/dioxin,

including birth defects in newborns whose parents were exposed to AO/dioxin.B. AO survivors have an increased capacity to care for themselves, and their families will have

an increased capacity to care for AO survivors.C. Increased capacity of healthcare practitioners to provide speech/physical therapy services and

to recognize and diagnose conditions caused by AO.D. Increased capacity of special education teachers to provide quality education to children with

disabilities.E. More certified speech pathologists in Quang Binh able to provide speech therapy services.

Main Results Set 4: A. Medical experts will join and strengthen AEPD’s campaign to develop policy on Agent

Orange in Vietnam.B. A strong argument, based on solid research, for including seven additional AO-related

conditions that feature on the American list, to the list used by the Vietnamese government.C. AO survivors participate in developing the policy for deciding AO subsidies.D. Expert support for AEPD’s advocacy, increasing the likelihood that the government will

agree to expand compensation.E. Government officials are informed on the evidence surrounding AO conditions and are

persuaded to work towards expanding the Vietnam AO conditions list.

Main Project Activities Set 1: A. Establish 24 speech/physical therapy sections for healthcare clinics at the commune level by

providing equipment, such as stethoscopes, ridged endoscopes, UV or infrared ray machines, and electric lines for acupuncture stimulation. (8 sections/per year, all 8 districts)

B. Equip 96 AO survivors with assistive devices, such as eye glasses, wheelchairs, adhesive electrodes, and provide home-based, outreach-worker peer support to help AO survivors understand physical therapy techniques. (Year 1-3, all 8 districts)

C. Form 8 children’s/family social groups for second and third generation AO survivors. (Year 1-2, all 8 districts)

D. Integrate adult AO survivors into self-help clubs for men and women formed by the AEPD. (Year 1-2, all 8 districts)

Main Project Activities Set 2: A. Outreach-workers will conduct individualized vocational training courses for men and

women household providers of families with AO survivors. (85 persons/year, all 8 districts)B. Outreach-workers will conduct group business management sessions for men and women

household providers of families with AO survivors. (170 persons/year, all 8 districts)C. Support men and women individual household providers and groups of household providers

by assisting them with designing/implementing their business plan, and by financing individual and group seed funding/ business startup costs. (170 persons/year, all 8 districts)

D. Expand AEPD’s current website to include a supply chain management component and an e-commerce platform, which features and sells goods and services produced by PWDs and their families. (Year 1-2, all 8 districts)

E. Set up a physical store front in Dong Hoi City that markets and sells goods produced by PWDs and their businesses. (Year 2, Dong Hoi City)

Main Project Activities Set 3: A. Conduct 18 commune level AO prevention education workshops. (6 workshops/year, all 8

districts)B. Provide home-based, outreach-worker peer support to AO survivors for education on the uses

of assistive devices, speech therapy techniques, available services in their district, holistic dioxin decontamination methods, and cancer treatment methods and early detection education. (Year 1-3, all 8 districts)

C. Enhance the training of healthcare practitioners from 24 commune level clinics in speech/physical therapy methods for conditions linked to AO. (8 clinics/year, all 8 districts)

D. Upgrade three schools in Quang Binh by equipping classrooms with special education teaching resources, and by providing special education teachers with speech therapy and learning disability training. (1 school/year, Dong Hoi, Le Thuy, Quang Trach)

E. Create and fund a speech pathologist scholarship program (with the contingency of beneficiaries working in Quang Binh for 3 years following graduation) at the Ho Chi Minh City Pham Ngoc Thach University of Medicine, which is run by Trinh Foundation Australia (TFA). (Year 1, Danang City, Ho Chi Minh City)

Main Project Activities Set 4: A. Recruit doctors receiving speech/physical therapy training to help make advocacy materials

that will be used in appealing to the Vietnamese Government. (Year 1, all 8 districts) B. Conduct further research on AO by conducting additional surveys in 2 districts with the help

of a doctor. (Year 1, Quang Trach, Quang Ninh) C. Provide advocacy training to existing AO survivor DPOs. (Year 1-2, all 8 districts)D. Establish a partnership with the Vietnam Association for Victims of Agent Orange/Dioxin

(VAVA) and the Vietnam Science Council – two groups that advise on dioxin-related diseases (Year 1, Hanoi City)

E. Conduct 4 advocacy workshops for government officials that involve the recruited medical doctors, AO survivor DPOs, VAVA, and the AEPD. (Year 2-3, Hanoi City)

Proposed Locations of Activities: At commune level for 1 full province. Advocacy is national.

Annex A

Geographic Location of Proposed Project: Quang Binh is a coastal province of 8,000 km2 in the central region of Vietnam with a population of more than 853,000. 45,000 of this population are PWDs. Quang Binh is the second most impoverished province in Vietnam and this, combined with a large rural population, means that the prospects for PWDs are abysmal. The Department of Labor, Invalids, and Social Affairs (DOLISA) estimates 90% of PWDs live in rural areas where socio-economic opportunities and infrastructure are limited. The education level of most PWDs is extremely low—many are illiterate or receive education that does not cater to learning disabilities. PWDs in Quang Binh are the poorest people in the region. Approximately 25% generate an income, but through self-run businesses that have high initial capital costs.

Quang Binh was not heavily sprayed by Agent Orange during the war, but many soldiers from Quang Binh fought in the south and lived in heavily sprayed areas. According to the Department of Health (DOH), there are currently 15,324 directly exposed former soldiers still alive in Quang Binh today. After the war, these same exposed soldiers, as well as many now deceased soldiers, returned to Quang Binh and unknowingly passed the genetic consequences of dioxin to their children. As a result, Quang Binh has a large population of second and third generation survivors that need support. This places an enormous burden on care-givers and AO affected families. They report income loss, a lack of access to appropriate healthcare, and social exclusion and discrimination. Therefore, AO exposure not only affects the health and wellbeing of survivors, but also their families. Reports from DOLISA confirm that 19,187 people in Quang Binh are suspected of being afflicted by conditions linked to AO/dioxin. However, less than 30% of these survivors (5,707) receive governmental subsidies.

AEPD Past Performance: Since 2003, the AEPD has worked with an estimated 4650 landmine survivors/PWDs in Qaung Binh. From the provision of economic opportunities, strengthening of community based rehabilitation (CBR), and support for social inclusion, the AEPD has improved: 1) the family income of over 1,400 households and supported 35 business/production groups with over 200 members; 2) upgraded 17 commune clinics and provided training for 30 commune clinics; 3) and has supported 37 self-help groups/DPOs with over 1,400 members. The AEPD has also been involved in advocacy projects facilitating Vietnam’s signing of three international treaties affecting landmine survivor/PWDs: the Mine Ban Treaty (MBT), the Convention on Cluster Munitions (CCM) and the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD). In addition, The AEPD has successfully organized and chaired an advocacy workshop on the CMC with the Department of Foreign Affairs in Ho Chi Minh City and the Provincial People's Aid Coordination Committee, in order to conduct the first-ever national workshop on Victim Assistance and International Cooperation in Vietnam on July 07, 2009.