Nghe An: Water hyacinth 'kills' rivers

At Cau Ba River flowing through Dien Thai commune (Dien Chau),water fernThe water hyacinth covers the entire river surface, but no one has been seen to remove or dredge the riverbed. Some people in Hamlet 8, Dien Thai Commune said: "The water hyacinth covers the entire river surface, fish and shrimp cannot survive, and boats cannot move on the river. Our livelihood is gradually disappearing because of this water hyacinth."

In recent years, water hyacinth has turned this river into a "dead river", the stagnant water source turns black, smells bad, not to mention the garbage, plastic bags, and dead animals thrown into the river, causing serious pollution to households living on both sides of the river. It is worth mentioning that in recent years, the authorities of Dien Thai commune have not really paid attention, mobilized, and mobilized human resources to salvage water hyacinth to clear the canal.

Water hyacinth covers the entire surface of Cau Ba River through Dien Thai Commune, Dien Chau, but for a long time, the local government has not paid attention to mobilizing and removing human resources to clear the riverbed. Photo: Van Truong

Mr. Le The Hieu - Head of the Department of Agriculture and Rural Development of Dien Chau district said: District areaDien ChauCurrently, many rivers and canals are covered with water hyacinth, including Nha Le canal, Vach Nam canal, Do Lien canal, Cau Ba river... To solve this situation, every year Dien Chau district supports localities with 300 - 400 million VND to clean up water hyacinth.

The above amount of money is mainly used by communes to hire excavators to clear water hyacinth, and communes combine with youth unions, women's unions, etc. to do manual labor to clear water hyacinth.

Right from the beginning of this year's flood season, Dien Chau has mobilized forces to dredge over 30,000 m3 of mud and water hyacinth in the communes of Dien Lien, Dien Doai, Dien Hoang...

The problem of thoroughly treating water hyacinth is very difficult, because water hyacinth reproduces quickly, while mobilizing manual forces to treat water hyacinth is still limited...

Water hyacinth covers the drainage canal in Hop Thanh commune, Yen Thanh. Photo: Van Truong

In Yen Thanh district, the main drainage systems are also being covered with water hyacinth. It is easy to see the large drainage systems such as the Bung River, Han River, Roc Canh River in Nhan Thanh Commune, Yen Thanh and many small canals being "invaded" by water hyacinth.

Mr. Nguyen Si Tung - Chairman of Nhan Thanh Commune People's Committee said: During the rainy season, water hyacinth clogs most of the drainage system and river branches over 20 km long, causing slow drainage, local flooding in riverside hamlets, and many areas of summer-autumn rice are flooded...

Faced with the above situation, right from the beginning of the flood season, Nhan Thanh commune mobilized over 4,000 local workers to organize a campaign to salvage water hyacinth; up to this point, over 80,000 m2 have been salvaged. The difficulty in salvage is due to the deep and wide muddy river, excavators cannot enter, so water hyacinth must mainly be salvaged manually.

Dredging canals in Nhan Thanh commune, Yen Thanh. Photo: Van Truong.

Mr. Le Van Hong - Head of the Department of Agriculture and Rural Development of Yen Thanh district shared: Yen Thanh's drainage system includes the drainage canal system of Vach Nam, Vach Bac, Bau Chen, Bien Hoa, Trung - Long... currently almost completely covered with water hyacinth. Since the beginning of July 2021, the People's Committee of Yen Thanh district has directed the communes to mobilize forces to salvage water hyacinth, and at the same time, the district has allocated a budget to support over 300 million VND for key communes to salvage.

The Vu Giang drainage canal system is more than 12 km long, draining floods for the communes of Cong Thanh, My Thanh, Dai Thanh, Lien Thanh, Khanh Thanh; Currently, the communes along the river have salvaged over 300,000 m2 of water hyacinth.

Dredging water hyacinth and silting up the drainage canal in Vach Bac, Do Thanh commune, Yen Thanh. Photo: Van Truong

According to a survey, Nghe An currently has many rivers and important drainage canals being "suffocated" by water hyacinth, causing many consequences. According to experts, the solution to minimize the damage caused by water hyacinth is to use water hyacinth to produce biogas and compost: Water hyacinth, also known as water hyacinth, is a biological product with large biomass.

In some places, water fern is used as raw material or mixed with livestock waste for biogas fermentation technology to create products for daily use, saving fuel costs,...