Clean water and rural environment sanitation in vietnam

Clean water and rural environmental sanitation makes due contribution to improving local people’s quality’s life and producing safe agri-products. At the same they are also considered criteria for new rural development and establishment under the present integration context.

Current situation and challenges of clean water and rural environmental sanitation in Vietnam is described as: As of 2006, the percentage of local rural people who could make access to clean water was 66% throughout the country; the percentage of households who have sanitary latrines was 52%; the number of sanitary breeding facilities increased to 300 thousand units/year; rural environment has remarkable improved compared to last year. Although important achievements have been obtained, Vietnam’s clean water supply and rural environmental sanitation still meet many difficulties and challenges;

Water quality (including the quality of water supply scheme construction) in general remains poor. It has not yet met the requirements as set. So far, 34% rural population has not yet made access to clean water. Out of 66% of rural population who can access to clean water, only about 30% of them can have TC 09 –qualified clean water supply. Many areas are suffering from water pollution caused by more serious salt penetration and wastes from the animal-raising industry, trade villages and agri-chemical use, which has negative impacts to local people’s daily life and health conditions. In addition, a quite high content of asen is found in the underground water in many plain areas compared to the allowable percentage. This is considered as a large challenge to processing technology and investment source.

The clean water supply distribution is not equal. Out of 7 economic and ecological zones, 4 zones has more than 60% of their population provided with clean water , and the 3 remaining zone has less than 50% of their population making access to clean water. Local people living in mountainous, coastal areas with water scarcity can consume only less than 20 liter/person/day; many areas face up the scarcity of water for 5-6 months, for instance, Southern Central Region, Central Highland and the high rock mountains;

The sustainability of clean water is not yet high. The quantity and quality of water supply is decreasing in many areas; water quality control is not as regulated, especially in case of small-scale water supply schemes. Cost-effective and sustainable water supply scheme management remains poor, most of them fail to cover fees and charges of operation, maintenance and repair, leading to serious degradation and even discontinued operation. Some schemes invested and managed by private sector or co-operatives seem to be better, however, they can only meet the demand for simple reproduction.

Waste and water treatment method and technology applicable to rural areas and especially in traditional villages is a burning issue which has not been efficiently resolved. The Programme 1999 – 2005 only managed to supply only domestic water for local people. It did not comprehensively put premium on environmental sanitation, waste water and waste treatment. This is one of main cause for hindering the trade village and animal husbandry development in rural areas.

Rural sanitation has been gradually improved compared to the previous time, however, as not much as the clean water supply. So far, up to 50% of households throughout the country has not yet made access to hygienic latrines. This causes pollution to surface water sources serving population communities. In addition, local authorities and people’s awareness remains limited. They prefer water supply to hygienic conditions.

The total investment capital has not yet met demands and the capital distribution has not yet been really appropriate. Although the investment capital is distributed higher from post-year to pre-year, the total central budget remains poor compared to the set demands (only 22% of the total capital mobilized).

The State Budget mainly focuses on supporting difficult regions, policy-targeted households, poor households, remote and isolated areas and on constructing new schemes. It invests less in telecommunication, capacity building and scheme repair and restoration;

The market for clean water and rural environmental sanitation has not yet clearly established. The existing investment incentive policy and credit mechanism has not yet attracted different economic sectors in the society, especially private sector.

According to the statistics 2003, about a half number of seriously infectious disease (influenza, diarrhea, malaria, petechial fever, bacillus dysentery, parotitis, amib dysentery, HIV/AIDS, hepatitis, varicella) is attributed to water resource and rural environmental sanitation. This shows that it is necessary to further focus on water supply and sanitation conditions aiming to gradually control and reduce the number of diseases;

Schools, health care stations and other rural public works have received attentions and concerns over clean water supply schemes and rural environmental sanitation conditions. However, what have they achieved is still trivial compared to their needs. Many schools are still in short of water supply schemes and latrines. Some others have but unhygienic ones. Many newly-constructed public works have no water clean supply and hygienic conditions.

In such cases, Under the National Target Program for Clean Water Supply and Rural Environment Sanitation 2006 -2010 approved by the Prime Minister, the following targets shall be met: 85% of rural population making access to clean water including 50% of them having access to clean water IS 09/2005/QD-BYT; 70% of rural household having hygienic latrines; 70% farmer households having hygienic animal-breeding facilities; all rural kindergartens, schools, health care stations, commune headquarters and other public works having their clean water and hygienic latrines; control over environmental pollution in trade villages, especially food-processing villages. Aiming to meet the aforesaid objectives, the following major solutions should be made:

• Mobilize the wide-range involvement of the entire society, economic components, especially private sectors in investment in clean water supply and rural environmental sanitation development; attract different economic sectors to participate in investment through a respected and equal policy mechanism
• Enhance information exchange – education – communication, aiming to improve local people’s awareness of sanitation and the relation between clean water, sanitation with health conditions;      
• Encourage rural population using clean water and hygienic latrines; provide necessary information for local people to make their own decision on suitable water supply technology and hygenic latrines; encourage local people having their good personal, public and environmental sanitation practices; persuade local people voluntarily contribute their finance and labor force to constructing clean water supply schemes and hygienic latrines;
• Revise, evaluate and modify the master planning and detail planning for water supply and rural environmental sanitation, serving as a background for the 5-year development plan and annual work plan, however, based on grassroots level; further promote the administrative decentralization with aims to ensure provinces to take initiative in making their planning, implementing and managing clean water supplies and rural environmental sanitation;
• Socialize financial sources as focus by all means of encouraging and developing legal framework for local people’s and different economic sectors’ and the entire society’s investment in clean water supply and rural environmental sanitation; promote driving force of users aiming to partially contribute to water supply construction and cover total cost of management, operation and maintenance; stimulate international cooperation (multilateral and bilateral cooperation, non-refundable ODA, credit loans, or joint-ventures) aiming to attract more capital sources; expand the market for clean water supply and rural environmental sanitation via State and international soft loans granted to developed areas and plain areas; gradually reduce State Budget for such areas prioritizing remote mountainous and natural disaster-prone areas;
• Diversify suitable modes of water exploitation and use technology, improve water quality, suitable for natural conditions, social and economic situation of certain areas, ensure the principle of sustainability; seek and make the best use of water resource; stabilize extremely difficult areas (such as areas where often suffer from drought and floods, high mountainous areas and islands); provide water for densely-populated areas; upgrade and extend the existing water supply schemes; waste treatment technology: research and introduce new technologies which helps local people select and adopt suitable technologies, at the same time study to reduce cost price of such technologies
• Comply with the planning, plan and projects approved by competent agencies for construction and development; involve people in making planning, investment preparation, technological selection and construction supervision: management method and ownership shall be clarified at the beginning of project proposal, which is considered as a prerequisite for project approval; Current status of management and exploitation of existing water supply schemes shall be evaluated; operation and management regulation, especially appropriate financial mechanism conform to the scale and local socio-economic conditions shall be formulated, ensuring sustainable development. The suitable roadmap of the change in management and ownership shall be developed; cost price of water shall correctly and adequately count on production costs; individuals and organizations shall be entitled to operate their water exploitation services; and investors are enabled to self control their finance during their business operation. In case that the price unit of water is lower than the cost price, financial subsidy shall be identified and water users shall be responsible and obligated to pay water charge conditional on their actual consumption and at the price unit as prescribed. In case of small-sized water schemes owned by households, they are self-constructed and self-managed by their owners. However, technical and technological guidelines and operation regulations shall be provided, ensuring water resource exploitation and environmental protection
• Focus on human resource development and training at all levels and with the participation of all employees involved in water supply and environmental sanitation; concentrate on practice rather than pure theory; prioritize training for operation and maintenance workers who are local indigenous people aiming to create job opportunities and develop local people’s occupation;                                                        

In short, clean water and rural environmental sanitation is now an urgent issue in Vietnam. It is required to pay due attention and make great investment from relevant agencies, including foreign investment. By all these ways, local people’s life could be improved and Vietnam’s agriculture and rural areas could produce clean and safe products under the context of international integration          

Cow raising for meat on large- scale farms

According to Animal Husbandry Department under MARD, the cow raising for meat has been developed dramatically over recent years. So far, the whole country has had nearly 6.8 million cows, including more than 50% of the entire herd in the South; the average increase in the number of cows is nearly 10%/year; this figure is 17% in 2006 alone. Recently, the number of  cow-raising farms has been also increasing, especially in the South, to 4,858 farms, accounting for 73.9% of the total number of cow-raising farms nation-wide (6,405 farms). Many cow-raising farms have at least 100 units, for instance, in Binh Phuoc, Binh Thuan, Ninh Thuan and Southeast region. The modern breeds, cattle feed, breeding facilities and tending procedures has been introduced into the cow-raising farms. This contributes to producing beef products and restructuring agricultural and rural economy structure with aims to create job opportunities and increase incomes for producers, at the same time attract many different economic sectors to invest in cow-raising industry. In parallel with cow-raising growth, cow breed improvement, many localities and agencies have also developed the grass production areas aiming to provide fresh grass for the herd of cows in order to reduce the beef production cost. According to inadequate statistics, the total grassland is 27,000ha. A series of high yield exotic grass species have been introduced and tested successfully, in which modern grass varieties are interested by farmers. For instance, grasses are mixed with gramineous plants and Australian Lythraceae grass species, Supperdan, Sweet Jumbo, Dairy Mix, Beef Mix grasses.

However, home-made beef production has not meet the domestic consumption demands. Beef has been additionally imported from the United States, Australia and New Zealand with aims to meet the domestic consumption demands and tourists’ need. Therefore, the cow-raising industry has a big opportunity of developnebt in order to meet the present and future domestic consumption demands. Aiming to meet the target of increasing the number of cow herd to 7.84 million units in 2010 and 12.46% million units in 2020; increase the number of hybrid cows and cows for meat from 25.5% (2006) to 32% (2010) and 45% (2020); increase the total beef production o 222,000 ton (2010) and nearly 425,00 tons(2020). The Animal Husbandry Department has made the following solutions: make planning for cow-raising areas; implement the strategy for domestic cow breed improvement; convert farming land into intensive grass production and cattle fresh feed production, especially modern high quality grass species; use agricultural by-products for cows; disseminate the technical procedure for feeding up cows for meat;   keep the breeding facilities hygienic; and maintain veterinary to ensure safety and prevent diseases; in addition, propose investment and credit policies on expanding the herd of cows.

At the recent conference on cow-raising industry, Mr. Vu Van Tam, Vice Minister of MARD has evaluated achivements in raising cows for meat and directing the cow-raising industry for the period 2008-2020 on farms and at the industrial scale. According to Vice Minister, aiming to have a breakthrough in the farm-driven and industrial-scaled cow production industry adopting the Chain of Custody ”from farm to dining table”, aiming to control good quality and ensure food safety and hygience. First of all, it is advised to encorugae large-sized processing enterprises to take initiative in producing and linking with consumption markets; or these enterprises make joint venture in organizing food production and processing. Regarding the price unit of hom-made beef, Vice Minister said that the unit price is not high as the world price. However, it is neccessary to take good measures in preventing the herd of cows fro diseases and improving the quality and ensure food safety and hygience aiming to improve competitiveness and target at export;

Enhanced dissemination on cattle and poultry disease control

Aiming to develop the farm-driven cow-raising industry at the industrial scale, from 2007 now on, the National Agricultural Extenstion – under jurisdiction of MARD has been assigned to disseminate disease control and make coordination with mass mediato lauch propagandization program in an attempt to raise farmers’ awareness and change their raising, transporting, slaughtering and business practices as well as involve local people and local authorities at all levels in cattle disesase control;

According to National Agriculture Extension Center, risks of bird flu and green-eared pig disease is still very high throughout the country. It is possible to strongly spread from now to the end of 2007. According to the rule of bird flu over 4 recent years, this disease is prone to break out and spread at the large scale by the end of the year due to climate and weather conditions and the growth of raising, transport and trade of cattle and poultry.

Aiming to control, prevent and absolutely wipe out this disease, the National Extension Center continues cooperating with mass media to propagandize risks, progress, treatment method and control measures against these cattle and poultry diseases; at the same time disseminate measures in centralized cattle raising, biological safety; veterinary, environmental sanitation and food safety;

In terms of bird flu and green-eared pig disease control until the end of 2008, according to Dr. Tong Khiem, Director of  National Agricultural Extension Center, since bird flu adn green-eared pig disease appear, the National Agricultural Extension Center has implemented a series of disease control programs. During the 3rd Quarter of 2007 alone, the Center has organized 3 forums on safe animal husbandry. In 2008, the Center shall continue further disseminating different diseases caused by the animal husbandry, at the same time organize models of animal husbandry in combination with disease control.

Vietnam’s 132 agricultural products with high quality and commercial prestige in 2007

The Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development (MARD) has just made decision on issuing ”High Quality and Commercial Prestige Certificate 2007” to qualified Vietnamese agri-forest products. In which, the ruber production industry has 63 products manufactured by such Companies as Ba Ria, Dau Tieng, Dak Lak, Dong Nai, Phu Rieng, Phuoc Hoa, Tay Ninh and Dong Phu. The coffee production industry has 6 products produced by Tin Nghia Coffee Company, Thang Loi Coffee Company; the Central Highland Coffee Investment, Ex-Import Stock Company; 2-9 Coffee Ex-Import Company Ltd and Buon Ho Coffee Company. The tea production industry has 10 products from Hung Cuong, Cau Tre, Phu Tho, Than Uyen, Song Lo Tea Companies and Vietnam Tea Corporation. The cashew production industry has 7 products in the meanwhile sugar production industry has 7 products; the forest production industry has 3 products; and the pepper production industry, vegetables and fruit production and cattle feed production industry has 1, 10 and 22 productions respectively.

This certificate shall take effective for 5 years upon receipt of hand-over