Vietnam begins ecologically based rodent management

Vietnam—If rats could understand humans, they’d probably be scampering off for their lives in this Asian country. The project on integrated ecologically based rodent pest management, funded by the Australian Centre for International Agricultural Research, took its first big step by holding training workshops on Knowledge, attitudes, and practices (KAP) and Socioeconomic (SE) surveys at the plant protection departments in two Vietnamese provinces (see Ecological rodent management workshop in Vietnam in RIPPLE Vol. 1, No. 2).

These 2006 workshops were held on 8-9 June in An Giang Province (southern Vietnam) and 12-15 June in Ha Nam Province (northern Vietnam). The two principal trainers were Dr. Flor Palis (International Rice Research Institute, IRRI, and Irrigated Rice Research Consortium, IRRC) and Dr. Peter Roebeling (Australian Commonwealth Scientific and Research Organisation, CSIRO). Fourteen participants attended in each session, composed of staff from the provincial plant protection department, plant protection stations, and agricultural extension.

Plant protection department staff discuss the survey questionnaire. (Photo by F. Palis)

This project will focus on developing effective pathways for delivery of integrated ecologically based methods for rodent management to poor farmers in the Red River Delta and central coastal zone of Vietnam, and in West Java and South Sulawesi in Indonesia.
Ecologically based rodent management is a concept that has grown popular since the late 1990s in developing countries, and aims to combine basic and applied research on rodents by focusing on the population ecology of rodents, and developing management skills directed at the agroecosystem level.

In An Giang, activities were led by Ms. Nguyen Thi My Phung, vice director of the province’s Plant Protection Department (PPD), and Le Ahn Tuan of World Vision, a nongovernment organization project partner. In Ha Nam, Dr. Dinh Van Duc Duc, principal officer of Plant Protection Hanoi, took charge, together with Dr. Huy, Ha Nam’s PPD director, National Institute of Plant Protection’s Dr. Tuan, and Ms. Nga from Hanoi’s PPD planning office.

The workshops aimed to train our partners in the national agricultural research and extension systems in conducting surveys and to enhance their interviewing skills. Key parts of the training included lectures, a discussion of the survey questionnaire (initially developed by scientists at CSIRO and IRRI), and hands-on training in conducting interviews with farmers in the field. After field interviews, the questionnaire was revised based on participants’ experiences and feedback. The survey questionnaire developed from this training will be used by the participants in the two provinces.

Ms. Nguyen Thi My Phung, vice director of An Giang’s plant protection department, interviews a farmer. (Photo by F. Palis)

A month after the workshop, Ha Nam trainees started the KAP and SE household survey in Binh Luc and Kim Bang districts for a total of 300 farmers. Randomly selected farmers came from Trung Lương commune, Binh Luc District, and Ngọc Sơn and Le Ho communes of Kim Bang District.