Erosion damages a road along the Trà Nóc River in Thới An Đông Commune in Cần Thơ’s Bình Thuỷ District. — VNA/VNS Photo Thanh Liêm

CẦN THƠ — The Cửu Long (Mekong) Delta city of Cần Thơ is facing serious erosion along its rivers, which has damaged roads, houses and other properties.

On Tuesday (May 23), a group of leaders of the city People’s Committee inspected erosion along the Ô Môn River in Thới Lai District and the Trà Nóc River in Bình Thuỷ District. 

The Ô Môn River in Thới Phước 1 Hamlet in Thới Lai District’s Tân Thạnh Commune was eroded along a section 55 metres long and eight metres wide on May 20, causing a four-metre wide section of road to fall into the river and block travel.

Previously, on April 2, the area was eroded in a section of 58 metre length. After the incident, local authorities installed barriers to ban people entering the eroded area, and used cajuput stakes and plastic sheets to temporarily repair it.  

The Ô Môn River’s section in Thới Lai Town’s Thới Hoà A Hamlet in Thới Lai District was eroded in a section 30 metres long and impacted the travel of people. The town People’s Committee has temporarily repaired the eroded area to secure travel.

Nguyễn Thành Út, chairman of the Thới Lai District People’s Committee, said that while waiting for the city People’s Committee’s plan of building concrete erosion prevention embankments in the two eroded areas, the district has decided to build two urgent embankments at a cost of VNĐ2 billion (US$85,000).

He petitioned the city People’s Committee and the city steering committee for climate change response, natural disaster prevention and control, and civil defence to allocate funds to repair the district’s eroded areas.

He also petitioned the city People’s Committee to have a plan to build 13 erosion prevention projects with a total length of 7.1 km along the Ô Môn River, areas which have high erosion risk.

The Bình Thuỷ District People’s Committee petitioned the city People’s Committee to allocate funds to repair erosion along the Trà Nóc River in Thới Thuận area in Thới An Đông Commune. 

Thới Thuận area was eroded in a section 100 metres long and 50 metres wide, damaging the road along the river and blocking travel.

Nguyễn Ngọc Hè, deputy chairman of the city People’s Committee, asked local authorities and the two districts’ steering committees for climate change response, natural disaster prevention and control, and civil defence to inspect the installation of barriers and ropes in eroded areas to warn people.

Local authorities and the steering committees should create safe temporary paths for travel and encourage households to move their construction works and fences out of eroded and erosion-prone areas, he said.

The province’s Irrigation Sub-department should collect the petitions of localities and consult the city People’s Committee to allocat- funds to repair eroded areas, he said.

Localities should inspect erosion along rivers and canals at the beginning of the rainy season, encourage households living in erosion prone areas to move to safe areas, and take erosion prevention measures such as building temporary or biological embankments, he said.

The city has taken various measures, including building embankments, to prevent and mitigate the damage of erosion along rivers and canals in past years. 

It had 262 erosion cases along a total length of 9.8km of rivers and canals in 2010-22, causing four deaths and five injured and damaging 94 houses, according to the department.

The major reasons for the erosion were the changes in water flow at bends in rivers and canals, weak banks, illegal construction of infrastructure and houses along banks, use of boats, excessive mining of sand and the reduction of sediment deposits in the Mekong River. — VNS