Research on Community - Based Organizations (CBOs) was carried out in 2008. The results from this enabled SRD to update our practices towards providing better support for CBOs and importantly, to provide evidence - based advocacy input to the government's Decree 151/2007/ND-CP on the organization and operation of cooperative groups.

In 2009 SRD, in collaboration with the Rural Development Center (RUDEC) and the Institute of Policy and Strategy for Agriculture and Rural Development (IPSARD) conducted research on "Impacts of economic downturn on people's life and social welfare policy" to submit to the Standing Committee for Economy for the National Assembly meeting of late 2009. In order to provide more information on the issue to the next National Assembly meetings, SRD and RUDEC have also collaborated with the Central Farmer's Union and Action Aid Vietnam to evaluate the impacts of economic downturn on rural households and the effectiveness of several stimulus policies of the government. Self assessments of farmers were collected from 894 communes in eight provinces including Lang Son, Bac Kan, Nam Dinh, Nghe An, Quang Nam, Binh Thuan, Dak Lak, and An Giang, representing the country's different ecological regions. The research results were used as basis for policy recommendations to help farmers overcome the crisis situation.

The results recommend that the government should take measures to (1) stabilise prices of agricultural production inputs and outputs; (2) strengthen measures to ensure the quality of input materials for agricultural production; (3) enhance support and advanced technology transfer to local people; (4) promote domestic machinery industries for agriculture; (5) accelerate the process of issuing land use certificates to farm households; (6) continue to support interest rate subsidy loans for farmers; and (7) encourage credit institutions to provide trade credit to agricultural sector and rural areas.

In October 2010, SRD collaborated with the Hanoi Agriculture University to research the impact of hybrid and purebred rice production, and strategies of how they can contribute to poverty reduction and sustainable community development. This work assisted with the evaluation of results and impacts of SRD's ongoing "Conservation of farmers' rice seed varieties in Bac Kan Province" project.

The research was conducted in two communes of Ba Be district and two communes of Bach Thong district in Bac Kan province. The research team gathered secondary data from the Bac Kan Plant Protection Offices of the two districts and from the People's Committees of the four communes. Primary data was collected using questionnaires, interviews with farmers and government officials and with focus group discussion using PRA tools such as ranking, timelines, brain storming and SWOT analysis. The data was then analyzed to come up with a comparative analysis of the two varieties in terms of productivity, environmental implications and income benefits for the farmers. Based on the findings and analysis, the research offered some recommendations: (1) identify Bao Thai as a suitable rice variety due to its high yield and quality; (2) develop policies supporting local rice varieties which have high yield and good quality in the spring crop; (3) build a model of micro credit for poor farmers; (4) manage small irrigation systems and provide intensive training courses on pesticides and rice care for farmers.