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Program officer at the Global Green Growth Institute in Vietnam shares her personal experience of air pollution in her country – and what needs be done to tackle it

Pham will be a participant at the upcoming session in the series The Asia We Want: Building Community Through Regional Cooperation. All participants were invited to share their own vision for “the Asia we want.”

One morning I woke up and couldn’t see the building opposite my apartment. Everything was blanketed in a grey and thick air. I didn’t know what it was. My mom used to say that it was because of the weather (indeed, Vietnamese usually make “the weather” accountable for changes in the environment that affect them but outside of their control). Then I took a 40 minute-ride to the office and felt totally dizzy and exhausted. I didn’t know what kind of “weather” that was. Soon enough I realized it was the smoke, the dust, and everything else in the air.

The Environmental Performance Index (EPI) conducted by Yale University in 2016 ranked Vietnam 79th out of 132 nations in environmental quality. Moreover, air quality in Vietnam is ranked among the worst in the world, number 123rd. The sources of emission are mainly from coal-fired power plants, transportation, industrial emission, construction activities, waste incineration, household emission and transboundary pollution. In the city, transportation contributes a major share. Ho Chi Minh City alone has 7.3 million motorbikes (the highest number of motorbikes in the world) and more than 600,000 cars, consuming a total of four million liters of fuel a day. In the north, Hanoi is surrounded by factories and coal-fired power plants. When there is no rain or little wind, we all get a share of the manufacturing.

Air pollution is not a single problem. It is the result of a complex system failure that can’t be solved with a single answer. In Vietnam, air pollution is a spider web of overlapping responsibilities and policies that no single entity is willing to take up the task to solve it. The Ministry of Transportation, the Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment, the Ministry of Industry and Trade, the City’s People’s Committee and its Department, and the Provincial People’s Committee and its Department are all responsible to monitor air quality. Yet, none has done it. Since it’s in everyone’s mandate, it becomes a common good, and no one is willing to take the lead. As a result, millions of adult and children, including myself, suffer from respiratory diseases that are all because of “the weather.” After the forests, agriculture land, and water, is Vietnam selling its last resources for economic gains?

As the air has thickened over the years, the future looks bleak. We might not be able to reverse what we’ve done, but it’s not too late to bring back what we lost. Vietnam needs to recognize the side effects of its 20 years of economic development and give priority to clear up the consequences of the past. Air pollution is one of them.

Vietnam should set up an independent committee to monitor air pollution and investigate the sources of emission. Entities that do not follow environmental regulations should be punished, and those who do should be rewarded. Further, it needs to put in place strict regulations on private vehicles and provides appropriate incentives for enforcement. More importantly, Vietnam needs to give investment priorities to public transportation and take advantage of technology to ensure their effectiveness and efficiency.

Only when policy is green and policy implementation is adequate, does change happen in a way that we can all appreciate.

Minh Nguyet Pham is a program officer at the Global Green Growth Institute in Vietnam.

Session 591 - The Asia We Want: Building Community Through Regional Cooperation I - A Clean and Green Asia- is the first session of a new multi-year series held in partnership with the Japan Foundation. For more information on the Session, please click here. To keep up to date with the conversations taking place during the session on social media, follow #SGSasia.