The Partnerships for Enhanced Engagement in Research (PEER) awards, launched by the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) and the National Science Foundation (NSF), will provide grants to support and build scientific and technical capacity in the developing world.
The winners in Vietnam include a project to assess the impact emission reduction measures of short-lived climate forcers have on the air quality and climate in Southeast Asia, which will provide a scientific basis for recommendations to integrate air and climate quality into policy making.
The research was headed by Vietnamese scholars from the Ho Chi Minh City University of Agriculture and Forestry, Hanoi University of Science-Vietnam National University, and the Asian Institute of Technology in Vietnam, with support from their partners at Indonesia’s Bandung Institute of Technology and Clarkson University in the U.S.
The other project, entitled ‘Research and Capacity Building for Reduced Emissions from Degradation and Deforestation (REDD+) Livelihoods, and Vulnerability in Vietnam’, was developed by the Centre for Natural Resources and Environmental Studies under the Vietnam National University, Hanoi and the U.S.’s Rutgers University.
The project’s objective is to understand the impacts of payments for ecosystem services (such as carbon) on the change in land-use decision making of households in the forest areas and evaluate whether these land-use decisions to increase or reduce the level of social and biophysical vulnerability on forecasted climate changes.
Both projects will be conducted during June 2012- May 2015.
PEER is a USAID-funded competitive grants programme that is being administered by the U.S. National Academy of Sciences in co-ordination with the NSF.
The programmme received nearly 500 applications from 63 developing countries, of which 41 projects from 25 nations were selected based on scientific merit, contributions to national development, and strong collaboration between scientists in the developing country and their American partners.
USAID will provide a total of US$4.8 million to develop science and technology through this round of PEER. Each winning project will last from one to three years with budgets from US$30,000 to US$50,000 per year, depending on project size. Large and complex projects may receive up to an additional US$100,000 per year.