Environmental Protection: Starting with Raising Public Awareness

(Baonghean) - Environmental protection is a task that requires the whole community to have the same awareness and action. This work in Nam Dan district has achieved encouraging results, many residential areas always have clean houses, clean alleys, clean fields...

Good practice at the grassroots level

Although not yet meeting the new rural standards, Nam Xuan commune is proud of the increased awareness of officials and people in environmental protection. Here, almost every family has a 2-compartment cement pit to store waste; each field has a garbage tank and the commune has 3 centralized garbage storage areas. Walking on the clean concrete alleys of hamlets 6 and 7, visiting the families of Mr. Ho Sy Tu, Mrs. Ho Thi Bien... to see with our own eyes how people care for environmental work, we were told by Mr. Nguyen Huu Thuan - an agricultural and environmental officer of the commune: In Nam Xuan, since July 2012, the commune has focused on and invested funds for environmental protection work.

The commune has about 1,500 households, each household is supported by the commune to build a two-compartment garbage pit, containing solid waste and organic waste. For agricultural production areas, the commune has invested in 12 garbage pits located in the fields of 12 hamlets; in total, the whole commune now has 144 centralized garbage pits. The total cost of the commune to build garbage pits is about 700 million VND. On inter-commune, inter-hamlet, and inter-family roads, the commune assigns the responsibility to the youth union, women's union, farmers' association, and veterans' association. These organizations are responsible for monitoring, urging, and "taking care" of the roads with the people.

Garbage tank in the field in Nam Xuan commune (Nam Dan).

To protect the environment in cemeteries, Nam Xuan commune has invested about 1 billion VND to build fences. "Since the environmental protection project was launched, and especially when the commune invested in building garbage tanks and centralized garbage storage areas, people's awareness of environmental protection has increased significantly. People know how to classify garbage, which types can be burned, they process at home, which types cannot be processed, they collect and then gather at the centralized landfill..." - Mr. Nguyen Huu Thuan happily added.

In Nam Cat, a commune that has just been recognized as meeting new rural standards, environmental protection work has also been done in many effective ways. Previously, the commune promoted and mobilized people to build furnaces to collect and burn waste at home. However, due to the characteristics of the waste incineration area near residential areas, it was affected by dust and smoke. Therefore, the commune has shifted to contracting with Vinh Urban Environment Company to collect waste monthly. The leaders of Nam Cat commune also shared more about their solutions in environmental protection, which is to establish a network of collaborators, who receive a small "salary" to monitor, supervise, mobilize, collect fees and work with self-management groups (organizations) and people in the area to clean sewers, village roads and alleys. Ms. Phan Thi Ly - a female cadre of Tho Moi hamlet, an environmental protection collaborator, said: "It's called "salary" for fun because it's only 50,000 VND/month. But we don't really care because this job is close to family and village life. Moreover, Nam Cat people have a high awareness of environmental protection work, and the payment of 3,000 VND/person/month is also very complete and on schedule...".

Located adjacent to 5 communes, towns, National Highway 46 and having many service establishments, production and business, markets..., Xuan Hoa has always encountered many difficulties in environmental protection. After developing an environmental protection project, Xuan Hoa also signed a contract with Vinh Urban Environment Company to handle waste. Every Friday afternoon, people bring the collected waste to the gate so that on Saturday morning, Vinh Urban Environment Company will send trucks and workers to collect and move it away. In addition, focusing on propaganda work and strictly handling individuals who violate regulations... Ms. Chu Thi Son - an agricultural and environmental officer of the commune said: "Previously, many people outside the area often transported garbage to National Highway 46, in the commune area, and then littered. Faced with that situation, the commune police monitored and caught many cases, made records and imposed fines of 1 - 2 million VND, forcing them to clean up the area where the garbage was dumped. These cases were then reported in detail on the radio system. After many times like that, the problem of littering has decreased significantly...".

Stick to reality, direct closely

Shredded waste burned at home

In the environmental protection project, period 2010 - 2015, Nam Dan district conducted a specific assessment of the current environmental situation. From the water environment, air environment and pointed out some areas that are being polluted such as solid waste (domestic waste, medical waste); wastewater (residential wastewater, craft villages); agricultural production (pesticides, fishing); industrial production, small-scale industry, construction, craft villages; domestic water, sanitation works; market areas... At the same time, pointed out the limitations and proposed directions, measures to overcome and resolve.

In which, we focus on information and propaganda in many different forms, from the communication information system, billboards, posters, leaflets... to raise awareness of environmental protection in the community; planning, construction and management of landfills; promoting socialization; investing in environmental protection in agricultural areas; handling pesticide residues; protecting the environment in industrial production, handicrafts, construction, transportation, service areas...

At the same time, Nam Dan district, based on the budget capacity and other legal capital sources, arranges appropriate funding for environmental protection work; signs labor contracts to support state management tasks; collects environmental sanitation fees according to provincial regulations and organizes and directs implementation. In June and September each year, officers assigned to implement the project are responsible for reviewing the implementation of environmental protection work at each commune level. After that, issue a document assessing the work done; pointing out the shortcomings and limitations of each content according to the environmental criteria of the national program on new rural construction; giving suggestions on how to do it and requesting the commune level to implement it within a specific time. "The most recent time was in September 2014, the Department of Natural Resources and Environment pointed out to Nam Giang and Nam Trung communes that the renovation of fences, cleaning of village roads, cemetery management, wastewater drainage systems... had not met requirements; at the same time, it proposed a number of solutions for implementation. With the proposed solutions, both communes have thoroughly taken action to resolve them, so after a short time, the remaining limitations in environmental protection work were resolved, and were recognized by superiors as meeting standards..." - Head of the Department of Natural Resources and Environment Nguyen Thanh Lam discussed.

Currently, although Nam Dan has only 4 communes Kim Lien, Nam Cat, Nam Giang, Nam Trung recognized as meeting national standards for new rural construction, in almost all communes in this locality, environmental protection work has really changed. That result stems from the change in awareness of all cadres and people about environmental protection work. And this is truly the goal to ensure sustainable development that we need to strive for.

Nhat Lan