Climate change is a global issue, which receives the attention of all classes in society, from the highest leaders to the local people in all countries and regions in the world.

The results from scientific research in the world and in Vietnam has shown that climate change is imposing greater impacts on the activities of socio-economic development and environmental protection in all regions, which has become one of the greatest challenges to sustainable development of humanity in general and to Vietnam in particular.

Being aware of the importance of climate change to the country’s development, the Government of Vietnam has approved and is implementing the National Target Program to Respond to Climate Change (NTP-RCC), the National Strategy on Climate Change and is preparing to implement the National Action Plan on Climate Change from the national level to the Ministerial, sectoral and local levels. These programs have identified that one of the important tasks is to integrate climate change into socio-economic development strategies, planning processes and plans to implement the activities of climate change response effectively and align the objective of climate change response and sustainable socio-economic development.

This document aims to provide policy-makers from the central to local levels with general information on climate policy integration, the activities implemented before mainstreaming, the mainstreaming process as well as the tools that may be used to support the process of mainstreaming climate change into socio-economic development plans.