Viet Nam is still a predominantly agricultural country, with the farming sector contributing 24 per cent of its GDP and 30 per cent of its exports.

But its development is being threatened by pollution which has become increasingly serious in recent years, causing growing concern among the public and policy-makers.

Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development Cao Duc Phat admitted the rural environment had been polluted and groundwater and soil degraded in many areas, endangering the future of the economy.

Growing crops, which contributed US$9 billion to the country’s exports last year, has been one of the major causes of pollution.

Most areas in the country favour intensive farming and multiple cropping to increase output. This has caused an increase in pests like brown plant-hoppers, stunt rice plants and rolled leaves disease in rice-growing areas in the Cuu Long (Mekong) Delta and sugarcane areas in the central region.

Overuse of pesticides and fertilisers have also reduced the fertility of farming land.

This has caused serious soil and water pollution in many areas and an imbalance in the environment.

The unplanned expansion of area under cash crops has exhausted water resources, leaving coffee and pepper crops in many places in the Central Highlands and southeastern regions parched.

Livestock farming is also blamed for environmental pollution – it produces around 74 million tonnes of waste every year, of which only 40 per cent is treated before being released into the environment.

According to Hoang Kim Giao, director of the Animal Breeding Department, the country has around 16,700 animal farms and millions of households raising animals but only 1,700 of them have waste-treatment systems.

Because of the pollution, epidemics like bird flu, blue ear pig disease, and foot and mouth disease are a constant threat to the country’s poultry and livestock.

"Similarly, waste from aquaculture farms is also discharged directly into lakes, rivers, and seas without treatment ," Le Vien Chi, deputy head of the Department of Aquatic Production, said.

"Farming households are the first victims of this pollution, losing much of their shrimp and fish populations to diseases," he said.

Others sources of rural pollution are craft villages, especially those involved in processing agricultural products and foodstuffs.

According to Nguyen Binh Thin, deputy head of the Department of Science, Technology and Environment, soil in city suburbs and provinces are being increasingly contaminated by toxic metals discharged by industrial parks, craft villages, chemical fertilizers, and household waste.

Rural areas discharge more than 100 million tonnes of trash every year. This is expected to increase to 145 million tonnes by 2020. But only 30-40 per cent of it is being collected.

Solutions

Environmental protection is one of the country’s three main goals along with economic and social development.

Minister Phat said rural environmental problems must be settled by deploying national-level measures to ensure sustainable development of agriculture.

His ministry is preparing a set of standards for managing rural environmental issues.

It was also drafting policies to encourage the use of technologies to treat agricultural waste and investments in clean water supply and rural environmental protection.

Phat said, however, that it is necessary to improve social awareness of rural environmental protection in addition to strategies, programmes, and projects.

(Source:VNS)