[ingodirectors] Invitation to EU Meeting regarding Cost Norms 2009

[Marko Lovrekovic]

Dear colleagues,

Following my email from 3 weeks ago asking for your comments on the UN-EU
Guidelines for Financing of Local Costs in Development Cooperation with
Vietnam I have received a few responses, which I consolidated and sent to
the Delegation of the European Union to Vietnam. I also suggested that the
EU organise a meeting with INGOs to discuss the Guidelines deeper. They
replied today and invited 3 representatives from INGOs to a meeting that
will take place on:

*Monday 28 March from 9:30 am to 11:00 am (1hr 30min) at the EU Delegation*

Please note that the EU Delegation limited the number to three people only.
If you are interested in attending please let me know; and I will nominate 3
directors based on 'first-come first-choice' basis. It will be a unique
opportunity for those of you who implement UN/EU- or other European-funded
projects to discuss the cost norms and to suggest improvements to the EU
Delegation.

I have only received two responses and two acknowledgements (within the
deadline) from CHF, Care, Population Council and ADRA. Given their interest
- Tuyet, Peter, Meiwita and Oscar are welcome to confirm their willingness
to join the meeting. However, if they cannot make it and if somebody else
has a strong view on the Guidelines, please let me know as soon as possible.

Here is the summary of INGO comments received earlier:

HOTELS:
A number of rates have gone up significantly over the past couple of years.
For example, it is increasingly difficult to find a decent hotel in Hanoi
for the rates quoted in the 2009 Guidelines; while hotels keep on increasing
their rates. We hope that this will be taken into consideration.

CONSULTANTS:
INGOs would like to recruit highly-qualified local consultants but often
they are obliged to recruit (much more expensive) international consultants
since they cannot find adequate local consultants under the current rates.
The same stands for highly-qualified national staff for longer term
contracts.

TRANSLATORS:
Nowadays INGOs pay 10 USD per page for translation of documents. In order to
deliver highly-quality projects for their beneficiaries INGOs need to
have rates that will allow them to procure high-quality services.

TAXI FARES:
Taxi fares from the airport in Hanoi have always been a conflicting issue in
discussions around the Cost Norms. Airport taxis have recently increased
their rates significantly, so the fares in the Guidelines are already
outdated in this respect.

PER DIEM:
Due to currently high inflation in Vietnam, the rates for meals and
incidentals are a low. INGOs have also asked if the Cost Norms apply equally
to expatriate staff? From the perspective of many INGOs expatriates working
in Vietnam should have the same per diem as national staff.

GENERAL COMMENT:
When the previous Guidelines came out in October 2007 there were lots of
reactions amongst INGOs that the Guidelines may contribute to corruption
since some of the prescribed amounts were far below the market rates, which
potentially created fraud in paperwork; for example, consultants needed to
claim twice the time in order to get the same amount of honorarium as in the
open market. The prescribed rates also contributed to competition between
agencies.

I have re-attached the initial letter from the EU Delegation as well as the
original document (UN-EU Cost Norms).

Please respond directly to my email <director at ngocentre.org.vn> if you are
interested in joining the meeting next Monday.

Warm regards,

Marko
-- 
Marko Lovrekovic, Managing Co-Director
VUFO-NGO Resource Centre
La Thanh Hotel, 218  Doi Can
Hanoi, Vietnam
Mobile: +84 904 191 871
Phone: +84 4 3832 8570
Email: director at ngocentre.org.vn
Web: http://www.ngocentre.org.vn
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://ngocentre.org.vn/pipermail/ingodirectors/attachments/20110323/f93e2950/attachment-0062.html 
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: Note 1st march 2011.pdf
Type: application/pdf
Size: 47793 bytes
Desc: not available
Url : http://ngocentre.org.vn/pipermail/ingodirectors/attachments/20110323/f93e2950/attachment-0124.pdf 
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: UN-EU Cost Norms 2009.pdf
Type: application/pdf
Size: 90785 bytes
Desc: not available
Url : http://ngocentre.org.vn/pipermail/ingodirectors/attachments/20110323/f93e2950/attachment-0125.pdf