Lesson 2: Not finding common ground

(Baonghean) - Pollution-related issues have not been completely resolved, businesses and people cannot find a common voice, especially since Saigon - Nghe Tinh Beer Joint Stock Company invested in a production line to increase capacity to 50 million liters/year in 2005, making the story of overcoming environmental pollution at Saigon - Nghe Tinh Beer Joint Stock Company become more heated. People are upset and send petitions that have been prolonged and have gone beyond the level...

It must be affirmed that the process of expanding production and business, increasing capacity while the environmental conditions are not yet complete of Saigon - Nghe Tinh Beer Joint Stock Company has caused environmental pollution (emissions, coal dust, wastewater, noise, etc.) at many times, affecting the lives and activities of people. Mr. Ho Sy Dung - Head of the Department of Environmental Protection (Department of Natural Resources and Environment) said: "In fact, the company has been inspected and administratively fined many times by the competent agencies of the Ministry and the Department of Natural Resources and Environment for violating environmental protection regulations. However, the company has also made efforts to overcome the above situation by investing in technological lines, focusing on investing in and renovating the wastewater treatment system and implementing a number of measures to overcome and minimize environmental pollution...".

Mr. Pham Ngoc Mai - Head of Block 10, Truong Thi Ward, reflected on the pollution issue with PV.

In the conclusion of the environmental protection inspection of Saigon - Nghe Tinh Beer Joint Stock Company (Conclusion No. 3068 dated October 3, 2012) of the Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment, it is clearly stated that "the results of the analysis of wastewater samples after the company's wastewater treatment system before discharging into ditch No. 3 - Truong Thi ward, compared with QCVN 40: 2011, with Kq=0.9, kf=1.0 column B, the analyzed parameters all meet the permitted standards. The results of the analysis of the exhaust gas samples after the treatment system compared with QCVN 19: 2009/BTNMT (column three), the parameters all meet the permitted standards. The company has a hazardous waste source owner registration book, has paid environmental protection fees for wastewater, has reported the situation of generation and management of hazardous waste according to regulations and conducted periodic environmental monitoring.

However, at the time of inspection, the company did not have an environmental protection plan for the Project to Upgrade the beer production line with a capacity of 50 million liters/year, did not have a license to discharge waste into water sources; did not conduct waste monitoring, and did not monitor the surrounding environment according to regulations, violating Point C, Clause 2, Article 8, Decree No. 117/2009/ND-CP dated December 31, 2009 of the Government on handling violations of the law in the field of environment and was administratively fined VND 12,500,000.

Despite many efforts in handling and remedying environmental problems, in 2013, the company still had an unexpected incident that made people angry and sent petitions everywhere, carrying banners and slogans to put pressure on local authorities to ask the company to stop production and move the factory.

The company's management admitted that in 2013, the company had incidents related to the wastewater and flue gas systems, such as wastewater causing odors due to improper operation by workers and managers controlling the process, thereby weakening the microorganisms in an aerobic biological treatment tank. Coal dust was released into residential areas due to a broken pump of the wet dust suppression system, which the operator did not detect in time, and the time to purchase replacement equipment was long due to lack of availability on the market; scale buildup on the surface of the dust suppression tank reduced the effectiveness of the nozzles due to the blocking of the spray. The odor incident was due to cracks on the concrete surface of the tank cover during operation, and the technological pipes installed in the tank caused leaks at the attachment point to the anaerobic tank due to vibrations from the exhaust fan. The noise and unsanitary conditions at the factory's side gate were caused by vehicles entering and exiting to deliver goods; poor awareness of maintaining general hygiene...

In response to the people's complaints, on May 30, 2013, the company held a meeting with residents and representatives of Truong Thi ward at the ward People's Committee. At the meeting, the company director accepted responsibility, clearly stated the cause, and committed to quickly fix the problems. And in fact, the company has implemented a number of specific measures, such as: To fix the wastewater causing odor, the company replaced the process control staff; withdrew all microorganisms to the sludge silo for treatment; replaced new microorganisms for the incident tank so that the system could operate normally again. After 2 days, the problem was fixed. To avoid the incident of coal dust spreading to the residential area, the company replaced a new pump, installed 3 additional backup pumps; cleaned the inside of the dust suppression tank; built an additional 12m3 settling tank to settle the sediment to avoid damaging the pump. At the same time, move the vibrating exhaust fan to the ground, clean the tank surface and the joint between the lid and the tank wall, spread a layer of non-shrinkage additive; spread a layer of 200 grade crushed stone concrete 10 cm thick on the entire surface of the anaerobic tank where the odor originates to limit the spread of odor.

Regarding noise and unsanitary conditions in the side gate area, the company has issued a written notice to transport units, specifying that when transport units come to deliver goods at the back gate of the company, drivers are not allowed to honk loudly, affecting the activities of the neighboring residential area; vehicles entering to deliver goods must register serial numbers, vehicle numbers... The company has also urgently established a detailed Environmental Protection Project for the Saigon Nghe An Brewery with a capacity of 50 million liters/year approved by the Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment in Decision No. 2344/QD-BTNMT dated November 25, 2013. Conduct periodic air environment monitoring every 6 months; dust and noise every 6 months; wastewater every 3 months during normal production, once a month during peak production.

However, “if you don’t like it, the melon will have maggots”, the goodwill and efforts of Saigon - Nghe Tinh Beer Joint Stock Company were not recognized by the people and the situation remained tense. Even before the Lunar New Year 2014, some households in Block 10, Truong Thi Ward donated 20 million VND to buy materials to fill the ditch to prevent the beer company from discharging wastewater into ditch No. 3, but the local authorities discovered and stopped it in time….

Faced with the above situation, on February 25, 2014, the Standing Committee of the People's Council and the People's Committee of Truong Thi Ward organized a conference for the leaders of Saigon - Nghe Tinh Beer Joint Stock Company to dialogue with the people about the pollution caused by the company's production, with the participation of provincial and city representatives. At this conference, representatives of the people (mainly concentrated in block 10) proposed the Provincial People's Committee to suspend the production of Saigon - Nghe Tinh Beer Joint Stock Company; move the Saigon - Nghe Tinh Beer Factory out of the residential area; prohibit discharge into ditch No. 3 (during the time of relocation); handle the pollution of ditch No. 3 and the polluted area, compensate for health damage to people in the polluted area; When implementing environmental protection projects, there must be supervision from the people... At this dialogue, Director of Saigon - Nghe Tinh Beer Joint Stock Company - Mr. Hoang Lam Hoa said: "Currently, no matter how I explain, people will not believe or listen, I will take action with specific measures. Please give me time to overcome the problem of environmental pollution".

However, on March 15, 2014, a number of households, mainly concentrated in Block 10, still sent "rescue" petitions everywhere, even to the Central Government. Mr. Pham Ngoc Mai - Deputy Secretary of the Party Cell, Block 10 Block Leader - who directly drafted the petition, said: In reality, environmental pollution at the beer company is difficult to overcome because the technological chain is outdated, not synchronized, installed and renovated from the production facility of a soft drink factory in a narrow area and space, and is overloaded. Currently, the amount of untreated wastewater is continuously discharged into Canal No. 3 along Nguyen Xi Street, causing serious pollution for the entire Southeast region of Vinh City. More than a hundred people in Block 10 and neighboring blocks have died from cancer and many people are suffering from serious illnesses due to being infected with toxic waste, especially those who drink well water and those who have lived in the area for a long time. At the dialogue session on February 25, 2014, many households in block 10 also requested the beer company to "compensate for damage to people's health".

However, Mr. Pham Ngoc Mai (the representative of the people of Block 10 who spoke at the dialogues, directly drafted the petitions - as he said) also admitted that "people only doubted but had no basis", "my house was not affected, it was just a pity for the people". A resident of Block 10 said: "If we talk about health effects, the people who directly produce in the factory must be affected first, for decades now, no one has been affected...". According to Official Dispatch No. 3608 dated October 3, 2012 of the Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment, Official Dispatch No. 280KL-TTr-TNMT dated January 25, 2013 of the General Department of Environment as well as the monitoring results of the first quarter of 2014 of the Environmental Monitoring and Engineering Center (Department of Natural Resources and Environment), the quality of the beer company's wastewater meets the permitted standards.

In fact, not only the brewery discharges waste into canal number 3, but also domestic wastewater from residents of blocks 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 14... plus eateries, restaurants, hotels, car washes, turmeric production facilities... dump all kinds of waste into the canal, so in the opinion of many people, blaming the brewery for polluting the canal is not objective. Mr. Dau Hong Quang - Block 9's Block Leader said: "Objectively speaking, the environmental pollution in ditch No. 3 is due to the domestic water of the people in the blocks along the ditch, the beer factory is only a part of it. It is normal for waste to be soaked day after day and give off a foul smell. Even the claim that the beer factory causes cancer has not been proven by any assessment or basis. I signed the petition because they said that the block leader must represent the people (Block 9 has 13 households living along ditch No. 3). The purpose of signing is to propose to fix the pollution in ditch No. 3, not to sign to force the beer factory to compensate or move." Mr. Tran Anh Quyen - Block 14, also said: "Blaming the beer factory 100% is not right because the wastewater from residential areas is also discharged into the ditch, there are also restaurants, car washes, eateries... very dirty". The leader of Truong Thi ward also confirmed: "Ditch No. 3 is a civil construction and people's wastewater is also discharged into it."

Another reason that made people upset was that when increasing the capacity to 50 million liters/year, Saigon - Nghe Tinh Beer Joint Stock Company did not complete the detailed Environmental Protection Project, leading to people's suspicions about discharging waste beyond the capacity. This was a major shortcoming, but the company later corrected the shortcoming and the detailed Environmental Protection Project was approved by the Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment.

At the dialogue on February 25 and in the recent petition (dated May 4, 2014) representing the people of Block 10 to the General Department of Environment, Mr. Pham Ngoc Mai said that the beer company's preparation of a detailed Environmental Protection Project for the 50 million liter/year Production Project without consulting the People's Committee of Truong Thi Ward, organizing a dialogue with the residential community of Block 10 and the blocks surrounding the factory violated Articles 14 and 15 of Decree 29 dated April 18, 2011 of the Government; Article 6 of Circular 01 dated March 16, 2013. Therefore, the approval of the project by the Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment also made the people angry.

Regarding this issue, Mr. Bach Hung Cu - Deputy Head of the Department of Environmental Protection (Department of Natural Resources and Environment) said: According to Article 6, Circular 01 dated March 16, 2013 on consultation on detailed Environmental Protection Projects (Decree No. 29/2011/ND-CP dated April 18, 2011), the following specific regulations are provided: 1. The owner of the facility is responsible for sending a document with a summary of the main contents of the detailed Environmental Protection Project to the People's Committee of the commune or ward where the facility conducts production, business and services to request consultation.

2. Within 15 days from the date of receiving the document from the facility owner, the People's Committee of the commune or ward shall respond in writing according to the prescribed form. After this period, if the consulted commune or ward People's Committee does not send a written opinion to the facility owner, it shall be deemed to agree with the facility owner.

3. If necessary, before issuing a written response, the consulted commune or ward People's Committee shall request the facility owner to coordinate in organizing a meeting with representatives of the residential community to present, discuss, and dialogue on the detailed environmental protection plan. Clause 1, Article 15, Decree No. 29/2011/ND-CP dated April 18, 2011 stipulates the consultation of the commune or ward People's Committees directly affected by the project as follows: a. The project owner shall send a document to the commune-level People's Committee, representatives of the residential community, and organizations directly affected by the project, along with a summary document on the main investment items, environmental issues, and environmental protection solutions for consultation; b, In case of necessity, the People's Committee at the commune and ward level shall convene representatives of organizations and residential communities directly affected by the project, inform the project owner about the time, location, and participants of the dialogue session, and chair the dialogue with the project owner within 10 days at the latest from the date of receiving the project owner's written request for consultation.

In this case, Saigon - Nghe Tinh Beer Joint Stock Company sent Document No. 187/CV-BSGNT to the People's Committee of Truong Thi Ward asking for opinions on the detailed Environmental Protection Project for Saigon - Nghe Tinh Beer Joint Stock Company. On May 8, 2013, the People's Committee of Truong Thi Ward received the document and responded with Document No. 101/UBND-DT dated May 15, 2013 "basically agreeing with the summary of the content of the detailed Environmental Protection Project for Saigon - Nghe Tinh Beer Joint Stock Company" and "requesting that the competent authorities consider approving the detailed Environmental Protection Project for Saigon - Nghe Tinh Beer Joint Stock Company". Mr. Nguyen Tat Thien - Chairman of the People's Committee of Truong Thi Ward said: After issuing the document to the brewery, the ward also sent the public document to the blocks.

Thus, the Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment's approval of the detailed Environmental Protection Project of Saigon - Nghe Tinh Beer Joint Stock Company is in accordance with the law, while the previous two times (2005 Environmental Resources Impact Assessment Report and 2009 Environmental Protection Project) were not approved due to the lack of consultation and sociological investigation.

The unfortunate thing here is that the People's Committee of Truong Thi Ward followed the reverse procedure, which made the people angry and thought that the beer company "cut corners" and did not respect the people's opinions. In this case, if it was deemed unnecessary to summon representatives of organizations and communities directly affected for dialogue, the ward should have sent the document to the residential blocks before sending it to the brewery so that the people could participate in contributing their opinions.

Photo story:Reporter group