Coastal pollution may spoil big potential for marine tourism

      Experts discuss the connection between developing marine tourism and improving the environment with Thoi bao Kinh te (Viet Nam Economic Times).
* Dr Nguyen Van Phuoc (Assistant Professor and Deputy Director of the HCM City Department of Natural Resource and Environment)
With nearly 3,300km of coastline, Viet Nam has great potential for marine tourism development.
However, there is a number of areas for tourism that have been built with complete disregard of the construction plan, leading to eroding of the shore and weakening of the submarine ecosystem. Besides, waste water is directly discharged to the sea, which makes the pollution level of sea water even more serious. Additionally, oil from boats, ships and water entertainment equipment critically damages the tropical ecosystem.
In northern Quang Ninh province’s Ha Long bay, there are 21 sites of sea encroachment and another 17 where sludge is being discharged into the sea, which is directly damaging the world heritage site. In central Khanh Hoa province’s Nha Trang bay, one of the world’s most beautiful bays, there is an average of 10 tonnes of rubbish everyday from tourism services thrown to the sea.
Environmental protection in tourism plays an important role in creating sustainable development for the industry. In order to improve the State’s management ability of tourism activities and environmental protection, we need to collect information from tourism enterprises, which would contribute to better implementing the Environmental Protection Law.
Furthermore, administrative sanctions for tourism enterprises disregarding the law need to be concretely stipulated. Also, it is necessary to establish co-operation between the Viet Nam National Administration of Tourism, the Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment, and other relevant ministries, sectors and localities in handling the issue.
In terms of waste treatment, a heavier fine needs to be applied for enterprises discharging waste that cause environmental pollution. Applying modern waste treatment technology is absolutely necessary.
* Trinh Quang Dung (Institute of Physics - Viet Nam Academy of Science and Technology)
Solar power key for tourism and protecting the environment
Viet Nam’s demand for electricity will have increased by about 150 billion kWh by 2010. According to a statistic from the Ministry of Science and Technology, only 35 billion kWh of electricity is produced every year.
Solar power not only helps lessen the pressure on electricity demand, but also protect the environment.
Viet Nam is a tropical country with a high proportion of sunny hours, so to develop the solar power industry is appropriate and convenient.
The Solar Power Local Network (Madicub), which consumes all available sources of energy to create electricity, have been set up in some of the country’s tourist spots. The first Madicub system was set up on a tourist ship in Hoi An in central Quang Nam province in late 2000; it has produced nearly 13,000 kWh of electricity and cut down CO2 emissions by more than 11 tonnes. The solar power system used in U Minh Thuong National Park in the southern province of Kien Giang has also produced about 19,000 kWh of electricity and reduced CO2 emission by 17 tonnes.
Solar power has been initially set up in some tourism projects in Viet Nam. However, it has not yet been developed enough to meet the huge demand of the market. In order to effectively deal with climate change and environmental pollution, as well as to create sustainable development for the tourist industry, we need to widen the use of recycled energy, especially solar power.