CIDA-INC success story features Hatfield’s land mine and UXO work
Jun 19, 2004
The Canadian International Development Agency’s Industrial Cooperation Program (CIDA-INC) has featured Hatfield’s work supporting landmine and unexploded ordinance (UXO) clearance in Viet Nam as a project success story.
In 2001, Hatfield received CIDA-INC financial support to refine the technology for determining landmine and unexploded ordinance contaminated areas, for looking at related chemical contamination problems, and for developing and applying environmental mitigation and monitoring techniques appropriate to field conditions in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia.
Hatfield Consultants Ltd. initiated their first CIDA-INC supported project in Viet Nam in 1994. The project centered on the assessment of long-term impacts from Agent Orange, a herbicide used during the Viet Nam war. Agent Orange contains a highly toxic compound, dioxin, which has been linked to cancer, birth defects and other illnesses in humans. The project included the transfer of new technologies for environmental impact assessment, training, and impact mitigation measures to Hatfield`s Vietnamese, Thai, and Cambodian counterparts.
As in their work with Agent Orange contamination, capacity building and institutional strengthening inside Viet Nam were integral parts of the landmine program from the onset. Initial workshops were designed to maximize the constructive inputs of local residents, prototype tools and technologies were evaluated by local users, UXO clearance manuals were developed for use by local teams, Vietnamese partner agencies developed techniques appropriate to field conditions in Vietnam, more than half of the local residents trained in land reclamation and revegetation practices were female — in short, technology transfer and training took place at every step in the project.
Link to Original Story:
http://www.acdi-cida.gc.ca/cida_ind.nsf/vall/7B33B81912F8689185256BAC0056799D?OpenDocument
For more information, please contact us:
Grant Bruce
President
HATFIELD CONSULTANTS PARTNERSHIP
E-mail: hcp@hatfieldgroup.com
Tel.: +1 604 926 3261
Toll-Free: 1 866 926 3261
