A foreign researcher sends a draft budget to a Vietnamese partner: salaries as percentages of full-time effort, a lump sum for fieldwork, overheads at the home institution’s rate. The partner replies a week later with a completely different structure — labour costed in person-days by task, per-diems by location, a long list of small lines for stationery, printing and meeting refreshments. Neither version is wrong. They are built on different logics, and a joint project has to satisfy both.
This article explains the logic behind Vietnamese public budget norms, how to translate between the two structures, and which lines tend to cause problems when the time comes to settle accounts. Specific rates and rules change and differ by funder, so the aim is to help you ask the right questions, not to quote numbers.
Why the budget looks the way it does
Spending by public institutions in Vietnam is governed by norms set by state regulations and by each institution’s internal spending rules. Research projects funded from state sources, and often projects funded from other sources but managed through a public institution, are expected to follow these norms. The finance office checks every expense against them.
The norms answer questions such as: how much can be paid per person-day to a principal investigator, a key researcher, a technician? What is the per-diem for a day of travel within a province, or in a different province? How much may be spent on a workshop participant’s lunch? Which documents prove that a field survey actually took place?
The result is a budget that is detailed and conservative, built from units that can be verified. That is the framework your partner works in, and it is why a lump sum labelled fieldwork is not something they can accept as is.
Labour: person-days, not percentages
Many foreign budgets cost staff time as a percentage of a salary. Vietnamese research budgets typically cost labour as person-days per task, multiplied by a daily rate determined by the person’s role in the project. A work package becomes a list of tasks — design the questionnaire, train enumerators, collect data in district A, enter data, analyse — each with a number of person-days for each role.
This has practical consequences:
- The task list must be credible. Reviewers and finance staff look at whether the person-days for each task are reasonable. Inflating them is noticed.
- Labour payments are often supplements to salaries, not salaries. Public staff already receive a state salary. Project labour payments are additional, which is why the rates and the evidence for them are tightly controlled.
- Changing tasks later means changing the budget. If you decide mid-project to drop a district and add interviews instead, the person-day table may need formal revision.
When you write the work plan together, write it at task level from the start. It makes the Vietnamese budget easier to build and makes the joint plan more concrete for everyone.
Travel and fieldwork: per-diems, distances and receipts
Travel costs are typically built from per-diem rates that differ by location, accommodation limits per night, and transport costs supported by tickets or approved distance-based rates. Fieldwork budgets add payments to respondents or participants where allowed, payments to local guides or facilitators, and local transport.
Three points need attention:
- Payments to respondents and local helpers must be documented in ways that may be difficult in rural areas — signed lists, identity details. Agree what is feasible and ethical before designing the incentive scheme.
- Foreign team members’ travel may follow different rules from Vietnamese staff travel, depending on whose budget covers it. Decide which side pays for what.
- Vehicle hire is common for rural fieldwork and needs a proper contract and invoices. A cash arrangement with a driver that works fine in practice may not be acceptable at settlement.
Lines that do not translate
Some items common in foreign budgets have no comfortable home in a Vietnamese public budget, and some Vietnamese lines look odd from outside. The table below shows the usual friction points.
| Item | Foreign budget habit | Vietnamese budget reality |
|---|---|---|
| Overheads | Percentage of direct costs, set by home institution | Management costs are usually capped and defined by the funder or institution; may not match your rate |
| Equipment | Purchased as needed | Often restricted; purchases above thresholds require procurement procedures and may need approval |
| Contingency | A percentage for unforeseen costs | Usually not allowed as a separate line; changes require formal adjustment |
| Small running costs | Absorbed in overheads | Itemised: printing, stationery, communication, meeting costs |
| Expert opinion | Rarely a line | Payments for reviews of reports or instruments by experts can be a recognised line |
| Publication fees | Standard eligible cost | Eligibility and limits depend on the funder |
Translating between the two budgets
If your funder is foreign and transfers money to the Vietnamese partner, you will in effect have two budgets: one in your funder’s format, and one inside your partner’s institution, in the format their finance office requires. The safest approach is to build both from the same task-level work plan and keep a mapping table that shows which Vietnamese lines make up each line in your funder’s budget.
Steps that work:
- Agree the task list jointly, with person-days and locations.
- Ask your partner to cost it using their institution’s norms.
- Map the result onto your funder’s categories. Where your funder has a lump-sum category, check that the itemised Vietnamese lines underneath it add up and are eligible.
- Check that the transfer schedule matches when your partner needs money. Remember the calendar-year fiscal cycle on the Vietnamese side.
- Agree in writing who carries the risk if exchange rates move. A budget set in euros or dollars and spent in đồng will drift.
Transfers, contracts and tax
Money coming from abroad to a Vietnamese public institution for research usually needs a formal basis: a contract or agreement between institutions, sometimes registered or approved under rules for foreign-funded projects or non-refundable aid, depending on the source and size. Your partner’s international and finance offices will know which regime applies. Ask early, because approval of the agreement can take longer than drafting it.
Tax and invoice rules apply to many payments. Some items your partner buys must be supported by valid electronic invoices; payments to individuals may involve personal income tax withholding. These requirements are the reason your partner may ask for a little more than the bare cost of an item.
Mistakes that surface at settlement
- Agreeing a lump sum informally. Your partner will still need itemised evidence. If you have not budgeted for the paperwork effort, it lands on them.
- Moving money between lines without approval. What looks like a sensible reallocation may be a violation under the institution’s rules.
- Paying cash to field staff without documentation. Even small amounts can block settlement of the whole line.
- Ignoring exchange rates. A ten percent movement can turn a balanced budget into a shortfall the partner cannot legally cover from other funds.
- Setting deliverables that depend on equipment purchase. Procurement can take months.
A budget built at task level, costed with your partner’s norms and mapped carefully onto your funder’s format, takes perhaps two extra days to prepare. It saves weeks at settlement and protects your partner from a problem that, under their rules, is theirs alone to solve.
Frequently asked questions
Why does my Vietnamese partner cost labour in person-days?
Public research budgets in Vietnam follow cost norms that pay labour per person-day by role and task, usually as a supplement to state salaries.
Can we include a contingency line?
Usually not as a separate line. Changes are handled through formal budget adjustments, so build realistic estimates into each task instead.
Will my institution’s overhead rate apply to the Vietnamese side?
Rarely. Management costs on the Vietnamese side are generally capped by the funder or institution and may be much lower.
Who absorbs exchange rate losses?
Agree this in writing at the start. A public institution may not be able to cover a shortfall from other funds.
Can we buy equipment through the project?
Possibly, but purchases above certain thresholds involve procurement procedures and approvals that take time, so avoid deliverables that depend on quick purchases.
