Policy targets fishermen in four central provinces

Hanoi (VNA) – The Government is working on a master policy package to help people in the four central provinces affected by the environmental incident stabilise their lives and recover production, Deputy Prime Minister Vuong Dinh Hue said at a meeting with voters in central Ha Tinh province on August 4.

“The Government pursues a long-term, synchronous and specific policy, thus it has instructed provinces to provide full statistics and investigations of the total damage,” the Deputy PM said.

Beneficiaries are individuals, organisations and households that are involved in fishery activities, salt production or provide tourism services hit hard by the environmental incident in central coastal communes.

The policy package aims to revive fishery resources as well as in habitation of marine fish species, loan local residents to recover production, support vocational training, create jobs and medical insurance for local people, the Deputy PM said.

“Policies will also be made to provide credit for building new fishing vessels,” Hue said.

“Specific orientations are being discussed, conveying opinions from provincial authorities to ensure that those in need will receive what they really need.”

The mass fish deaths along beaches in the central region, including Ha Tinh, in early April, were found to be the result of flawed waste and wastewater treatment of Hung Nghiep Formosa Ha Tinh Steel Limited Company.

Formosa accepted responsibility for the incident and promised a total compensation of 11.5 trillion VND (500 million USD) to support local fishermen to switch to other jobs and recover the polluted maritime environment.

On July 1, Ha Tinh established a provincial council and missions at all levels to assess the damage caused to the province by the environmental crisis.

Initial statistics showed that Ha Tinh’s total seafood output in the first six months of this year was down 16,000 tonnes year on year.-VNA