Since last year, Hanoi people and enterprises have enthusiastically participating in the campaign of planting 1 million trees  by 2020. The Director of Hanoi Construction Department Le Van Duc said, thousands of trees have been planted in the city’s new roads. In July alone,  Hanoi has planted approx. 140,000 trees. Kim Quy Park in Dong Anh District, Phung Khoang  Lake Park in Nam Tu Liem District and  CV1 Park in the new urban area of Cau Giay are the newly built and expected to become the green spaces of the capital city.  At the same time, Hanoi People’s Committee has kicked off  the Yen Xa wastewater treatment project with total investment of 800 million USD. The project is expected to revive polluted rivers in Hanoi such as To Lich, Den Lu, Set and a section of the  Nhue river. 

The city’s  lake environment  has improved. According to statistics from Hanoi sewerage and drainage limited company, as of present,  85 out of 122 lakes in downtown Hanoi have been purified  while  44 out of 85 lakes in Greater Hanoi have been cleaned  by the end of Quarter I, 2017. The city has installed a thousand modern public restrooms. Moreover, the  city is working with Germany developing water purifying technology to provide drinkable water. Once the project is completed,  people can drink the water right out of the tap in accordance to European standard. 

On the other hand, the garbage collection technology has been modernized toward mechanization. According to the director of Hanoi Urban Environment One member (URENCO) Nguyen Huu Tien, 80% of the districts and 30% of Hanoi wards are collecting garbage through mechanization.  

However, there  still remain shortcomings during the process of environmental cleaning. As the director of Hanoi Natural & Resources Department Nguyen Trong Do emphasized, the city is facing with   air pollution, water surface pollution, underground water pollution;  the classification of solid wastes and garbage has not been carried out in downtown areas.

In order to overcome the limitations and to create fundamental changes in environmental sanitation, in May 2017, the Hanoi Party Committee issued the resolution no. 11 – NQ/TW on strengthening environmental sanitation in the area up to 2020 and the following years. Immediately after the issuance of the resolution, all levels and sectors of the City are required to urgently work out specific plan for implementation. 

The director of the Hanoi Department of Construction Le Van Duc said that the Department has developed a plan with 8 important contents to implement in the coming time. Accordingly, the water supply services will be expanded further and improved for both urban and rural areas in Hanoi. In addition, lake improvement should be reinforced and involve the private sector, so that by 2020, the severely polluted  lakes in downtown Hanoi and the Greater Hanoi  will be cleaned.  The construction of waste water treatment plants should be sped up in  industrial clusters with the aim of cleaning 100% of industrial waste water by 2020. Furthermore, resources should be focused to finish all the drainage and sewerage projects by 2020. Leaders of the Hanoi Department of Health also said that city targets completely shutting down medical waste incinerators by 2020 to be replaced by  a centralized treatment model to ensure proper disposal of medical waste according to regulations of environmental protection. 

Hanoi  city has asked relevant authorities at all levels to take overall measures, with special attention paid to the management, collection and treatment of medical waste; strictly supervise the   transportation and collection of demolition waste. In particular, the constructor needs to submit a transportation or waste grinding contract  when applying for construction permits. The People’s Committees of districts and wards ensure the timely collection and transportation of garbage and work with  socio-political organizations to  improve the public awareness of environmental sanitation, at the same time encouraging people to classify garbage. Especially, the in-charge agencies should encourage people to build flower garden in the balcony to create nice street landscapes. 

To implement  the resolution no. 11 – NQ/TU of the City Party Committee on environmental sanitation, the Chairman of the Hanoi People’s Committee Nguyen Duc Chung asked each agency and unit to formulate a concrete plan. Environmental sanitation  is a demand throughout the development process, and the whole political system. The business community and the citizens of the capital should feel responsibility to keep  their living environment clean.