About 15 million litres of clean water has been delivered to the drought-affected districts of Thuan Nam and Bac Ai in southern central Ninh Thuan province as part of the Vietnam Red Cross (VRC)’s urgent relief to local residents.

The water is donated by an affiliate of the Vietnam National Oil and Gas Group and the Coca-Cola Beverages Vietnam Co. Ltd. It was transported to Ninh Thuan’s Thap Cham train station free-of-charge by a subsidiary of the Vietnam Railway Corporation.

The water will be distributed to households in Thuan Nam and Bac Ai districts.

Ninh Thuan is also one of the four drought-affected provinces receiving 900 water tanks with a capacity of 300 litres each from the VRC.

The province has a population of 560,000 with 10 percent of the total households at or below the poverty line.

Acute drought from January to April this year has dried up local reservoirs, rivers and streams. Only 19 million cubic metres of water remains at 20 reservoirs across the province, comprising less than 10 percent of the water volume in years past.

The most heavily-affected areas are located in agricultural districts such as Bac Ai, Ninh Phuoc, Ninh Son, Thuan Nam , and Ninh Hai. Thuan Nam and Bac Ai have suffered from two consecutive years of drought.-VNA