Enhancing Worker-Management Relations in Vietnam | RFI 440 17 VN 00001

Opportunity Information: Apply for RFI 440 17 VN 00001

The grant opportunity titled "Enhancing Worker-Management Relations in Vietnam" (Funding Opportunity Number: RFI 440 17 VN 00001) is a USAID request aimed at identifying organizations or entities that have the practical capability to manage and implement a program focused on improving labor relations in Vietnam. It is issued as a Request for Information (RFI), which means it is primarily a market-sounding and information-gathering step rather than a full solicitation for immediate funding. In other words, the government is asking potential implementers to express interest and demonstrate relevant experience, likely to inform how a later formal funding competition or project design might be structured.

At the core of the opportunity is the goal of strengthening worker-management dialogue at the enterprise level in Vietnam. The concept centers on "social dialogue," meaning structured communication between workers (and/or their representatives) and employers/management to address workplace issues such as working conditions, dispute resolution, productivity concerns, and broader labor-management cooperation. The RFI specifically highlights the intent to develop a cadre, essentially a trained group, of Vietnamese Social Dialogue experts. These experts would be equipped to deliver training and provide coaching, suggesting a program model that goes beyond one-off workshops and instead builds sustained local capacity through mentorship, follow-up support, and practical on-the-job guidance for enterprises.

From an implementation standpoint, the RFI is looking for respondents with management and implementation skills and experience. That typically implies the ability to run multi-stakeholder programs, coordinate training activities, recruit and develop trainers or coaches, design curricula, monitor results, and adapt programming based on feedback from workplaces. Because the target is enterprise-level relations, a credible implementer would usually need experience working with businesses, workers, and possibly representative bodies, and be comfortable operating in settings where labor relations can be sensitive. The emphasis on creating Vietnamese experts also signals a strong local capacity-building angle, where the long-term outcome is to have in-country professionals able to carry the work forward.

Administratively, the opportunity is categorized as discretionary and lists the funding instrument type as a Cooperative Agreement, under the funding activity category of Employment, Labor and Training. A cooperative agreement generally indicates that, if funding later becomes available under a related solicitation, the government expects to have substantial involvement during implementation (for example, collaboration on technical direction, oversight of key milestones, or joint engagement with stakeholders). The CFDA number provided is 98.001, which is commonly associated with USAID foreign assistance programming. The issuing agency is listed as USAID-Bangkok (Thailand), which is consistent with USAID missions and regional platforms sometimes managing activities that span neighboring countries, including Vietnam.

In terms of eligibility, the listing states "Unrestricted," meaning the RFI is open to any type of applicant or respondent that believes it can contribute relevant information and demonstrate capability. The posting includes an original closing date of 2017-06-09 and a creation date of 2017-05-24, which places it in a specific historical window and suggests it was time-bound for collecting responses. The award ceiling is listed as 1, and expected awards is blank; for an RFI, these fields are often placeholders or not reflective of an actual planned amount or number of awards, since the government is not yet committing to a particular procurement path or final budget through the RFI itself.

Overall, this opportunity is best understood as an early-stage request by USAID to identify competent partners and gather input for a potential program that professionalizes and expands social dialogue expertise in Vietnam. The intended impact is improved workplace communication and problem-solving between workers and management, achieved by training and coaching delivered by a locally grounded network of Vietnamese specialists who can work directly with enterprises to strengthen day-to-day labor-management relations.

• The Thailand USAID-Bangkok in the employment, labor and training sector is offering a public funding opportunity titled "Enhancing Worker-Management Relations in Vietnam" and is now available to receive applicants.
• Interested and eligible applicants and submit their applications by referencing the CFDA number(s): 98.001.
• This funding opportunity was created on 2017-05-24.
• Applicants must submit their applications by 2017-06-09. (Agency may still review applications by suitable applicants for the remaining/unused allocated funding in 2026.)
• Each selected applicant is eligible to receive up to $1.00 in funding.
• Eligible applicants include: Unrestricted.

Apply for RFI 440 17 VN 00001

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