Handling environmental pollution caused by wastewater from industrial zones: A difficult problem

(Baonghean.vn) -Up to now, the province has 72 projects licensed to operate in the following industrial zones: Bac Vinh, Nam Cam, Hoang Mai, Dong Hoi. The establishment of industrial zones has created favorable conditions for planning, developing raw material areas, human resources and other supporting activities to serve the operation of the projects. However, how to ensure environmental sanitation in industrial zones, especially the collection and treatment of wastewater when factories are growing more and more, is an urgent issue.

Of the 72 licensed projects, only 33 have been put into operation. However, according to Colonel Tran Huu Hong - Head of the Environmental Police Department of the Provincial Police, it is most noticeable that currently in industrial parks, projects are still operating even though they have not invested in building complete infrastructure systems for environmental treatment. In particular, the solid waste collection system and centralized wastewater treatment system have not received much attention from investors. Industrial parks have only stopped at investing in building wastewater canal systems. 100% of industrial parks in the area have not built centralized wastewater treatment systems. Therefore, wastewater treatment in industrial parks is based on the awareness and capabilities of businesses! Meanwhile, businesses, for the sake of immediate profits and limited awareness of environmental protection, often take advantage of local investment attraction and incentive policies, take advantage of state management limitations on industrial parks and the incomplete infrastructure of industrial parks to violate and pollute the environment.

Check wastewater samples at the provincial police department.

In general, enterprises operating in industrial parks in our province are mainly small and medium enterprises. Therefore, investment funds to build wastewater treatment systems are still limited. The main violations include: Not building wastewater treatment systems, building but not operating or operating only perfunctorily, regularly discharging untreated wastewater or wastewater that has not been treated to standards into the environment, causing environmental pollution, affecting people's health. This is also the direct cause of conflicts between local people and enterprises. Because, in the process of building and putting industrial parks into operation, the land acquisition and clearance are still inadequate, the arrangement of jobs for local people after land acquisition as well as many other causes lead to disagreement between local people and enterprises and can give rise to crimes such as: disturbing public order, intentionally causing injury, destroying property, ...

For example, in 2010, due to dissatisfaction with the Sabeco Packaging Factory in Bac Vinh Industrial Park discharging untreated wastewater into the environment, killing rice of people in Hung Dong Commune, Vinh City, causing a prolonged lawsuit; or recently, the people of Nghi Yen Commune, Nghi Loc District, were upset with the environmental pollution caused by Minh Thai Son Company Limited in Nam Cam Industrial Park, so local people flooded into the factory, smashed and destroyed the company's property.

According to the investigation, the main reason for the existence of signs of environmental violations is that the operating mechanism and state management of industrial parks are in the process of being implemented and supplemented. Some state management functions overlap, lack synchronization and are inconsistent. Therefore, the effectiveness of implementing coordination work is still low. Moreover, the process of fighting against violations of environmental laws is not simple, because it is necessary to ensure harmony between the strictness of the law and the economic development policy of the province and the interests of the people. Meanwhile, the current sanctions for violations are still limited. The level of administrative penalties is still low compared to the cost of waste treatment, leading to the form of sanctions lacking educational, deterrent and preventive effects. Moreover, the Environmental Police force does not have the authority to decide to apply additional penalties such as: Temporary suspension, suspension of operations, forced relocation of violating enterprises...

In the coming time, the province needs to have stricter policies in granting construction and operation licenses for industrial parks and companies operating in industrial parks; linking licensing with the requirement to complete wastewater and waste treatment systems, only then can the pressing problem of environmental pollution caused by industrial parks be resolved.

Dang Nguyen