Difficult problem

(Baonghean) -While many localities are facing serious environmental pollution due to the amount of daily household waste being dumped everywhere by people, from alleys, village roads, alleys to canals, lakes, etc., in some rural areas in the province, waste collection has been maintained for many years, creating an aesthetic for the village. The problem is that there needs to be a solution and awareness to replicate good examples.

In Son Thanh commune (Yen Thanh), there has long been no more littering, plastic bags, bottles and spontaneous waste collection points. Mr. Le Van Du, in hamlet 10, said: “Each family has a garbage pit in the garden to sort waste, the decomposable waste is processed by the families themselves, the non-decomposable waste is collected, twice a week the hamlet’s environmental protection subcommittee collects waste from each family and brings it to the hamlet’s common collection point. Families that classify waste correctly and treat it well will be commended, on the contrary, families that collect, treat and classify waste incorrectly or dump waste in the wrong place will be criticized on the hamlet’s loudspeaker, the commune’s radio station and be administratively fined. Therefore, everyone is concerned about doing the right thing, without being reminded much.”

Garbage collection in Nghi Xuan commune (Nghi Loc)

With careful preparation, from the resolution to the implementation plan, Son Thanh commune has established a Steering Committee and in 19/19 hamlets, established an environmental protection subcommittee, including the hamlet chief and hamlet health workers, in which women play a leading role in propaganda as well as collecting and treating waste in hamlets. On the 18th and 30th of every month, the whole commune organizes a general cleaning; and every Saturday or Sunday, in each hamlet, each inter-family group, if they see their area is dirty, they clean it to ensure cleanliness. Ms. Le Thi Nguyen - President of the Women's Union of Son Thanh commune, said: Normally, the border areas between communes have spontaneous garbage dumps, so, in addition to ensuring hygiene within the commune, the commune has also assigned the commune police force and commune officials and civil servants on duty to prevent floods, storms, and forest fires every day to be responsible for patrolling and monitoring regularly, not allowing people from neighboring communes to dump garbage in the area. The commune also stipulates that each hamlet has 2 field guards whose job is to collect all kinds of packaging and bottles left behind by farmers in the fields. Thanks to that, the environment in Son Thanh commune today is very clean, from each family to the public.

Arriving at Nam Cat commune (Nam Dan), our first impression was that the roads, from the main road leading to the commune center to the inner-village and inter-village roads, were all very clean. Ms. Le Thi Nhung, Tho Moi hamlet, said: "Families must be conscious of maintaining public hygiene and neighbors have the responsibility to monitor each other." The Chairman of Nam Cat commune People's Committee said: The commune has developed a project for environmental protection along with the "5 no, 3 clean" movement launched and implemented very well by the Women's Union. In the past time, implementing the new rural construction program, the commune has focused on solving environmental problems in public areas... Households are very supportive and comply with the commune's policy, and at the same time contribute 1,500 VND/month per person (for agricultural production families) and 10, 20, 30, even 50 thousand VND/month for households participating in services, trading, and farming. From this source of income, plus the provincial budget to support local environmental protection work to serve the collection, transportation and treatment of waste in the commune and pay those who directly collect waste in the hamlets. Every month, on the 28th and 29th, the Women's Union and the Commune Health Station take the lead in organizing for the entire population to clean up and treat the environment in public areas. Currently, Nam Cat is continuing to direct the expansion of the rural traffic system and concrete construction according to new rural criteria with the construction of a drainage system on both sides of the road to lead directly to the fields. The plan is that by the end of 2012, the hamlets will complete this...

Many other localities in the province such as Nghi Xuan commune (Nghi Loc district), Thanh Linh commune (Thanh Chuong), Tan Phu commune (Tan Ky), Tay Thanh, Do Thanh (Yen Thanh) ... have also implemented effective waste collection, reaching over 80% of waste collected, without the situation of garbage backlog, causing pollution to the people. Through practical research in localities that have done a good job of waste collection in the province, it can be seen that, first of all, due to the propaganda and mobilization work of the Party Committee, the government and organizations; taking the Women's Union and the health station as the core; having a policy that is in line with the people's wishes, it has received strong support from the people.

Yen Thanh district is a locality that does a good job of collecting waste, with most communes and towns achieving a solid waste collection rate of 77% in the entire district, and currently mainly treating waste by burning. In some communes, families sort their own waste to burn on-site in each household; in others, groups and teams are established to collect and transport waste to a vacant area or a temporary landfill of the hamlet or commune and then burn it. It is known that currently, 20/39 communes and towns of Yen Thanh are building a centralized landfill but have not completed it, and 6 communes do not have a centralized landfill but have only arranged garbage pits in hamlets. In particular, the district's centralized landfill was initially planned to affect water sources and people, so they are asking to choose another location.

Thus, it can be seen that waste treatment is a difficult problem. At the same time, in principle, waste treatment does not allow burning but can only be applied according to the "3R" principle, which is to reduce, recycle and reuse. However, except for Vinh City and some neighboring localities of the city in Nam Dan, Hung Nguyen, Nghi Loc districts (approved by the Provincial People's Committee), waste is collected, transported and treated at Nghi Yen landfill, but the situation of burning waste for treatment is happening a lot in the localities. The application of this burning method has a positive aspect in that it mechanically reduces the volume of organic waste, plastic bags, and plastics, but it creates an extremely toxic dioxin derivative air environment. Or landfilling also causes groundwater and surface water pollution, while the majority of people in rural areas are mainly using groundwater for daily activities. Thus, the application of waste treatment measures in localities by burning or burying is unscientific and not allowed. In fact, many localities have planned centralized landfills but have not yet arranged land area and lack construction funds. As for centralized landfills at the district level, most districts have planned them but have not yet selected a location or have had to change the location; some localities are slow in clearing the land and implementing construction because of lack of funding (except for some districts of Tan Ky and Quynh Luu which have completed landfill construction). Currently, Dien Chau, Nghia Dan and Con Cuong districts have not yet planned a landfill. This problem is creating conflicts and confusion for localities in waste collection and treatment. Finding solutions to collect and treat waste in rural areas is a difficult problem for localities in the province.

To solve the problem of collecting and treating waste in rural areas in a synchronous, effective, scientific and environmentally friendly manner, the province needs to promote and prioritize budget resources for the construction of sanitary waste treatment sites in all districts, and at the same time have solutions for districts that have not yet found a location for landfill planning. Pay attention to creating mechanisms and policies to attract projects to participate in waste processing, these enterprises may also benefit as enterprises operating in environmental public services, because the machinery and equipment in this field are both expensive and have a short lifespan due to contact with acidic and highly saline waste, while the business interest rate in this field is not much. On the other hand, as we all know, plastic bags are a type of waste that currently occupies a large amount of land, so the problem is to limit the habit of using plastic bags among the people. Mobilize people to classify waste at source, to limit the amount of biodegradable waste dumped into the common environment that can be buried in each family's garden, returning the waste cycle. Promote the application of the "3R" waste management model to minimize the use of public land for landfill construction. To do this, it is necessary to mobilize grassroots mass organizations such as women's organizations, youth unions, farmers, veterans, etc. in propaganda and mobilization for people to implement.

Plum Blossom