A seminar on a joint project between Vietnam and Sweden to develop bio-energies and ensure energy efficiency took place in the Mekong Delta province of An Giang on June 4.

The project began in An Giang province in April this year and will run until December 2013.

Half of the 860,000 EUR investment comes from the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency (SIDA).

The project will provide technical assistance and enhance capacity in developing initial projects, as well as ensure the efficient use of energy, especially renewable energies.

Participants at the seminar also discussed building smaller community sized power plants fuelled by waste materials such as straw and rice husk in An Giang province in the near future.

The Swedish specialists talked about their experiences in accessing information services, market and financial techniques, building up businesses and financial planning.

According to Huynh The Nang, Vice Chairman of An Giang’s provincial People’s Committee, the project is extremely significant as utilising bio-energy fuels could ensure the province’s energy security and sustainable development.

He emphasised on the need to deal with waste from the agriculture and seafood sectors, and how it could be used to produce bio-energy, address environmental issues and minimise the use of fossil fuels.

The province is calling on businesses to get involved in renewable energies, efficient energies and other environmentally friendly projects to complement the Vietnamese-Swedish project to develop bio-energies, he said.-VNA