Jayne, 3rd year Honours Bachelor of Social Science in Conflict Studies & Human Rights
Host country : Vietnam
Canadian NGO : Mines Action Canada
Local NGO : Association for Empowerment of Persons with Disabilities(AEPD)
**names have been abbreviated to protect confidentiality**
This semester I have been interning with the Association for Empowerment of Persons with Disabilities (AEPD) Vietnam. AEPD is a small, local, women-led NGO that was established in 2010 to continue the legacy of the Survivor Corps/Landmine Survival Network which had been operating in Vietnam since 2003. AEPD works locally in Quang Binh province to improve the physical, mental, social and economic wellbeing of persons with disabilities (PWDs), empower PWDS to understand their rights and maintain agency over their lives, and encourage them to contribute back to their communities while reducing social stigma around disability. AEPD’s projects focus on sustainable livelihood development, improved healthcare access, increased climate resilience and community disability rights education. Their target demographics are people with disabilities (including survivors of unexploded ordnance and Agent Orange survivors), families with PWDs, local commune authorities and broader local communities particularly in rural or impoverished areas.
My first field trip with AEPD occurred on a scorching hot day in June, 2024. I had been invited into the field with one of AEPD’s outreach workers to observe his work in two rural communes in Quang Binh province. On this trip, our goal was to meet with two families who had been connected with AEPD by their local commune authorities for support, to discuss their current economic situation and develop more sustainable and reliable long-term models for income generation that align with each family’s vision of their future.
As it was my first time in the field, I really had no idea what to expect. Riding on the back of a motorbike along the highways connecting many of rural Vietnam’s communes, I was struck by the beauty of Vietnam’s vibrant landscapes. A haze settled over the rice paddies, blurring the shadows of the mountains in the distance. The air was thick with humidity and the sun blazed down on the road, creating a dome of heat that settled upon us as we zipped along the highway, a subtle breeze providing occasional relief.
We first arrived in Tan Thuy commune, Le Thuy district, and were greeted by the Chairman of the commune’s club for people with disabilities. Following him by motorbike, we travelled along narrow roads lined by homes, storefronts and farm fields. Navigating the labyrinth of village backroads proved to be difficult, and even though we were accompanied by a local official we made several wrong turns before arriving at our destination thanks to an array of directions from neighbours.
The first family we visited was that of a single mother, Ms. S, who is a second-generation survivor of the herbicide Agent Orange, which was used by the Americans during the Vietnamese-American war. Her father was exposed to the herbicide and it’s harsh legacy carried on to his daughter, leaving Ms. S with intellectual and speech disabilities. Ms. S has a shy but joyful daughter in grade 8, who lights up when she talks about her passions for literature, reading fiction, and her swimming lessons. She is top of her class in school and hopes to become a teacher one day. Together, they live on a small farm with approximately 2 acres of rice fields that provide their main source of income along with Ms. S’s government disability social allowances. Ms. S’s family qualifies as a near poverty household, bringing in a total monthly income of approximately 1,500,000 VND or 80 CAD. She experiences several intersecting barriers to income generation as a woman, a single mother, and a person with multiple (including invisible) disabilities, due to layers of social stigma and the additional childcare work of raising her daughter.
During our visit to her farm, I observed AEPD’s outreach worker work with Ms. S to collaboratively develop a plan for sustainable income generation that aligned with her capabilities, desires and needs. Ms. S expressed a desire to raise buffalos for breeding purposes, to boost her capacity for income generation on the farm and to provide money for food and education for her daughter. Her farm supported the conditions for raising, caring for and breeding buffalo, and she had developed a plan for procuring the appropriate grass feed and shelter for the buffalo. However, the prohibitive cost of the animal itself had previously prevented Ms. S from purchasing a buffalo. To support Ms. S’s plan for sustainable long-term income development through buffalo raising and breeding, AEPD agreed to subsidize the purchase of a buffalo by covering 14,250,000 VND of the total 17,500,000 VND cost, leaving Ms. S responsible for only 3,250,000 VND.
After visiting Ms. S and her family, we were back on the highways for an hour in the unrelenting afternoon sun and humidity, travelling to meet a second family in Ham Ninh commune, Quang Ninh district. Ms. T is also a second-generation survivor of Agent Orange, and was born with intellectual disabilities and epilepsy as a result of her father’s exposure to the herbicide. Ms. T’s disabilities have affected her health throughout her life and she has also faced great social stigma because of the invisible nature of her disabilities. Her husband is a friend of her father’s, and is 39 years her senior. They have two children together, an eldest daughter in grade 6 and a youngest boy in grade 4. Ms. T’s children are very shy but both have a passion for the arts, and dream of becoming a singer and a painter when they grow up. The family’s total monthly income from Ms. T’s government disability social allowance and her husband’s retired soldier’s pension is approximately 2,500,000 VND (approximately 135 CAD), in addition to the income generated from their rice fields. This qualifies them as a near-poverty household. Ms. T’s family has faced many challenges and barriers to income generation, including her husband’s old age and her own health conditions, along with the additional work of raising their two young children. To boost the family’s income and earn enough money to continue her children’s education, Ms. T expressed a desire to raise cows in the field beside their home. However, due to the similarly prohibitive cost of purchasing the animals, Ms. T has been unable to achieve this goal. On our visit to their family home, AEPD’s outreach worker consulted the family to develop a cost-sharing plan to purchase a cow according to their financial means. It was decided that AEPD would subsidize 14,000,000 VND of the total 16,000,000 VND purchase, and Ms. T’s family would be responsible for the remaining 2,000,000 VND deposit.
The type of support provided to both these families is part of a cost-sharing mechanism that AEPD employs in their projects to prioritize the agency of people with disabilities in the decision-making process and foster a sense of mutual responsibility for the collective success of the project. In this sense, AEPD’s goal is to alleviate the overwhelming financial barriers to sustainable income generation by providing tangible goods and transferable business skills that people with disabilities require to succeed in their entrepreneurial endeavours. AEPD also aims to motivate the recipients of their projects to become active and engaged members of their communities and maintain agency and responsibility over their finances and livelihoods. This cost-sharing mechanism builds a collaborative relationship between AEPD and the PWDs they support, and helps to ensure long-term project sustainability and success.
The process of developing a sustainable livelihood model with both families was very interesting to observe. Contrary to the approaches of other international development NGOs that often center Western perspectives in their activities at the expense of local community priorities, AEPD has sought to ensure that the needs and interests of PWDs in Quang Binh province are the primary focus of their work. I was excited to learn about this PWD-centered approach, and to see these projects carried out by and for local communities and PWDs in Quang Binh province. The level of community collaboration and consultation at every step of this project – through involvement of PWDs, community authorities, and outreach workers who share similar lived experiences with AEPD’s target audiences – really emphasized to me the importance of prioritizing PWD’s autonomy and agency when working in this development sphere.
Although I encountered a language barrier while observing these consultations as a Canadian student who does not speak Vietnamese, the AEPD outreach worker I was accompanying on the field trip translated many important points from the consultation to me via google translate so that I would be able to understand the gist of what occurred during the discussions. I also had the opportunity to talk with both families during the visit over google translate to learn more about their lives and goals from the project. They were eager to describe the ways in which financial support from AEPD would alleviate some of the many challenges they faced when developing sustainable and secure livelihoods, and expressed an overwhelming sense of gratitude for the assistance.
After spending time at each family’s farm to develop a comprehensive livelihood support plan, we delivered the paperwork for each project proposal to the local commune authorities for approval. A key factor in the successful implementation of AEPD’s projects is the development of positive working relationships with local government officials across the province. This relationship builds trust with local communities, legitimizes AEPD’s work through local government approval and develops connections that often help facilitate future projects and community outreach in these areas. After receiving the proper government approval to implement these livelihood support models, we visited Ms. S’s and Ms. T’s farms two more times over the following weeks to assist with the purchase of a buffalo and cow from nearby local farmers and to transition these animals over to Ms. S’s and Ms. T’s farms once the appropriate shelters were built. These field trips allowed me to follow the project from its design phase in the office to the implementation phase in the local communities. I learned a lot about the lived realities of people with disabilities in Quang Binh province and effective strategies for enacting change at the local level. I was so grateful to the families for their kindness in hosting us at their farms, and to my colleagues at AEPD for facilitating such an impactful learning experience.