Illegal sand mining in Do Luong is a pain in the ass.

(Baonghean.vn)Recently, along the Lam River flowing through Do Luong district, illegal sand mining has been quite common, regardless of legal regulations; causing loss of state budget, riverbank erosion, environmental encroachment, significantly affecting people's lives and production.

For many months now, illegal sand mining in Dang Son commune (Do Luong) has been complicated. Many areas of fertile land in Dang Son commune have been eroded, of which, the erosion has been from 30 to 50m wide, some sections have been eroded more than 100m and extended over 700m along the Lam River, especially in the areas of hamlets 2 and 3. On the morning of October 20, we were present in hamlet 2, Dang Son commune. Many people in the hamlet were very upset about the sand mining affecting the crop area.

Sand and gravel quarryLuu Son commune - Do Luong.

Mr. Nguyen Van Thu - Head of Hamlet 2, Dang Son Commune said: Every day, dozens of boats and barges regularly dredge sand day and night in this area. About 20 years ago, the main flow was near Do Luong Town and Luu Son Commune, but now the flow has changed to the dike of Dang Son Commune, causing erosion of about 2 hectares of people's crop land. If this situation continues, people will gradually have no more land to produce."

Mr. Thu's concern is also the concern of many people in Hamlet 2 when every day, every hour, illegal sand and gravel mining has gradually destroyed their cultivated land. Most of the alluvial land here is used by people for agricultural purposes such as growing mulberry and corn. During the rainy and stormy seasons, the river's flow changes, causing landslides in many sections. Many places are sucked up to 10 meters deep, creating dangerous whirlpools.

More seriously, not only affecting agricultural land, the rampant exploitation of sand and gravel in Do Luong district has changed the direction of the flow, threatening national projects such as Do Luong bridge and Bara dam (Do Luong). Mr. Nguyen Ba Phuong - Head of Bara bridge management group, said that recently, many sand mining boats have dug the foundation, causing the dam body to tilt.

According to our observations, at many sections of Lam River flowing through Do Luong in communes such as: Luu Son, Trang Son, Boi Son... on average every day there are dozens of ships with a capacity of 30-40m3 freely sucking sand in the middle of the river.

Along with that are unlicensed docks operating in Luu Son, Thi Tran and Trang Son communes. Located about 100m from Do Luong bridge are 2 sand docks in Luu Son commune that have been operating for many years. Each sand dock is reinforced with very solid sandbags. When we arrived here, the sand trading was quite busy. On the shore, there were 7 IFA trucks waiting to transport sand. On average, each truck of sand costs 150,000 VND, which means that each day the sand docks earn tens of millions of VND.

It is known that recently, the functional forces of Do Luong district have repeatedly organized inspections and handled illegal sand and gravel mining activities, but most of the violations that were caught have only stopped at confiscating vehicles and imposing administrative fines, so there is no deterrent effect.

To properly manage resources and avoid impacts on people's production and national projects caused by illegal sand mining, it is necessary to have synchronous coordination between departments and branches. Accordingly, in addition to conducting inspections and reviews of organizations and individuals, the number of boats and machinery involved in the exploitation, transportation and trading of sand and gravel in the area, authorities at all levels and functional departments and branches need to assess and zone sand and gravel resource areas to prevent the current widespread and massive exploitation.

Huy Phong