One of the photos displayed at the exhibition (Source: thethaovanhoa.vn) Hanoi (VNA) – The United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) in coordinationwith photographer Nguyen Viet Hung, or Lekima Hung, organised a photoexhibition on plastic waste in Hanoi on June 4.
Themed“Save our seas,” the five-day exhibition, the first of its kind in Vietnam, aimsto respond to World Environment Day (June 5) and World Oceans Day (June 8).
Addressingthe opening ceremony, Caitlin Wiesen, UNDP Country Director in Vietnam, calledfor practical activities to create a greener and cleaner Vietnam.
LekimaHung expressed his hope for higher public awareness of plastic waste and thatmanagement agencies will issues policies to fight plastic waste.
Ondisplay are more than 100 photos elected from over 3,000 works taken along morethan 3,000 km of coastline in 28 cities and provinces, and more than 100estuaries.
Vietnam is one of Asia’s five worst polluters ofocean plastic waste, according to international organisations. With 13 milliontonnes of waste released to the ocean every year, the country ranks17th in the world for ocean plastic waste pollution.
Although there are no official statistics on theamount and varieties of plastic in the Vietnamese sea and islands, plasticwaste is easy to see in Vietnamese waters, with the country’s 112 estuaries themain gateways of plastic to the ocean.
Numbers from Vietnam’s Association of Plasticillustrate the scale of the problem. In 1990, each Vietnamese consumed 3.8kg ofplastic per year, but 25 years later, the figure hit 41kg.
As many as 1,000 plastic bags are used eachminute but only 27 percent of them are treated and recycled.
The Ministry of Natural Resources andEnvironment estimated that about 80 tonnes of plastic waste and bags are thrownaway every day in Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City combined.-VNA
VNA
