Ha Noi, July 18–19, 2024 and Da Nang City, July 25-26, 2024, Wildlife Conservation Society, Viet Nam Office (WCS Viet Nam) in collaboration with the Viet Nam National University of Forestry (VNUF), organized two training courses on “Skills to detect and handle violations in the forestry sector”.
Overview of the training in Ha Noi, July 2024
The training courses brought together 65 forest rangers and officers from national parks and forest protection departments across 25 provinces/cities in Viet Nam, along with representatives from other forestry research and training institutions.
Participants in the training, Da Nang, July 2024
The training programs were organized to pre-test the learning materials on “Skills to detect and handle violations in the forestry sector” that have been jointly developed by the WCS Viet Nam and VNUF. The learning materials include three core parts: (i) Legal system for management and handling violations in the forestry sector; (ii) Methods for identification of faurna and flora species that are commonly exploited and illegally traded; (iii) Skills applied in detecting and handling adminiatrative and criminal violations in the forestry sector. Particularly, the third part focused on illegal wildlife trade investigation skills including: collecting and consolidating information and evidences of the wildlife- related violations, crime scene investigation, interviewing offenders, witnesses and other related people, developing case files.
Participants practice identifying some types of forest products, Ha Noi, July 2024
After the pilot training courses for both VNUF students, forest rangers and officers from national parks and forest protection departments, WCS Viet Nam and VNUF will finalize the learning material package and agree on a roadmap for integration of the learning module on “Skills to detect and handle violations in the forestry sector” into the official training program for VNUF students in the next school year (2024-2025) which will start in September 2024.
These training courses were conducted within the framework of the project “Scaling up efforts to counter wildlife trafficking in Viet Nam” funded by the Bureau of International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs (INL), United States Department of State, implemented by WCS in Viet Nam.