AIT to help support NUOL's development of administrative capacity and management skills
Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency (Sida) council on 14 June 2006 approved the allocation of 8.5 million Swedish Krona (SEK) for the extension of the current agreement on bilateral research collaboration between Sida and the National University of Laos (NUOL). The agreement which ended 30 June 2006 will be extended to 31 March 2007.
The support for research cooperation was initiated in 2003 with a focus on training of lecturers. So far 18 Ph.D. students from five Faculties (Agriculture, Education, Forestry, Science, and Social Sciences) have started their trainings at Swedish universities and 32 Master's students have started their trainings at various Thai universities.
Sida will continue to support the strengthening of management capacity of NUOL through internal checks, external audits and staff training. It was proposed that AIT be contracted to provide continuous support to the development of administrative capacity and management skills at NUOL. During this period Sida in consultation with NUOL will enter into dialog with AIT in order to support NUOL's basic research administration routines—to establish administrative routines for all administrative units involved with the Sida/SAREC programme at NUOL and regular follow-up of the research administration and continuous capacity-building of the research administration at NUOL.
The estimated budget for AIT support under this extended agreement is 400,000 SEK for the duration of nine months.
In addition, AIT also discussed with NUOL on curriculum development for Master's level courses in some focused areas. AIT's School of Environment, Resources and Development is already involved in training a number of Master's students from NUOL's Faculty of Forestry and Science in the current collaboration. In the future, AIT may also be involved in coordinating Master's students in Thai universities.