HCM City (VNA) – The Southern Institute of Water Resources Research has outlined a set of measures for authorities in 12 provinces and cities to enact in order to protect the Dong Nai River from pollution.
Speaking at a recent seminar, the institute’s deputy director, Do Tien Lanh, said the rapid economic development of the river basin area in recent years had contributed to pollution.
The increasingly threatened river network supplies water for about 12 million people and 1.85 million ha of cultivated land running through HCM City and many surrounding provinces.
According to the Environmental Protection Department, Dong Nai River is polluted by untreated wastewater from millions of households and thousands of factories.
Some areas are particularly toxic. The amount of coliform, a bacteria that causes gastrointestinal disorders, at the Bien Hoa section is estimated at between 186-920 times higher than the safety level.
The Thi Vai River is the most polluted river in the Dong Nai system, with a 10 km section from Suoi Ca – Thi Vai to My Xuan Industrial Park called the “dead river .”
The institute’s river basin protection project, approved by theGovernment last year, would cost about 2 trillion VND (125 million USD) and run until 2020.
Under the plan, a Dong Nai River Basin Protection Committee would be set up to monitor human impact on the river environment, and new factories would be equipped with clean technologies.
Eighty percent of industrial parks and export processing zones in the basin are slated to have wastewater treatment systems by 2010.
The river basin is home to 56 industrial parks and export processing zones, 21 of which have wastewater treatment systems.
Earlier this year, authorities from 12 provinces and cities in the river basin said they would not award licences to polluting industrial projects.-Enditem
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