Trà Vinh City’s rubbish landfill in Châu Thành District was closed in 2018 because of overloading and severe pollution. — Photo nhandan.vn

TRÀ VINH — The Cửu Long (Mekong) Delta province of Trà Vinh plans to collect and treat 98.5 per cent of household solid waste in urban areas by 2025.

The province also aims to collect and treat 80 per cent of household solid waste in rural areas by 2025.

Solid waste from the agriculture, industry and healthcare sectors will be collected and treated separately. 

Nguyễn Huỳnh Thiện, deputy chairman of the provincial People’s Committee, said that most household solid waste was transported to concentrated rubbish landfills and buried, which is not an environmentally sound practice.

Under the People’s Committee’s plan to collect and treat solid wastes in 2021 – 30, the province will build waste-burning plants and later build waste-to-energy plants that will produce electricity.

The province will seek investors for six waste treatment plants by 2030.

It plans to close nine rubbish landfills that cannot receive new solid waste in 2021- 25 and will close six other rubbish landfills in 2026 – 30.

The province in 2018 closed Trà Vinh City’s rubbish landfill, the largest in the province, because of overloading. Located in Châu Thành District’s Lương Hoà Commune, it stored about 200,000 tonnes of solid waste and caused severe pollution.

There are 18 rubbish landfills in the province.

The province releases about 401 tonnes of solid waste a day and only 294 tonnes of the amount, or 73 per cent of the solid waste, are collected and transported to rubbish landfills.

The remaining solid waste is treated by local residents who burn or dump the waste. — VNS