Residents receive free clean water from a water supply site in Ben Tre province (Source: VNA) SocTrang (VNS/VNA) - All residents in rural areas of the Mekong Deltamust have access to clean water, Nguyen Hoang Hiep, deputy minister ofAgriculture and Rural Development, said at a seminar held in Soc Trang provinceon May 27.
Hiep urged the delta, which includes 12 provinces and Can Tho city, toimprove water quality and to encourage residentsto use water efficiently.
About 96,000 households with a total of 430,000 people in rural areas inthe delta face clean water shortages during the dry season becauseof saltwater intrusion, deteriorating water supply systems, anddeclining groundwater resources.
Most of the households live in Ben Tre, Soc Trang, Kien Giang, Ca Mau, BacLieu, Long An and Tra Vinh provinces. The provinces have set up freewater supply sites and transported clean water from other places tothese households.
He said that the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development (MARD) overthe long term would work with other ministries to build irrigationprojects to solve water shortages during the dry season.
The delta should also repair existing concentrated water supply projects,he said.
In the next three years, delta provinces should expandtapwater pipe networks, drill concentrated bored wells in areas withno access to tap water, and build water containers for the 96,000rural households without access to clean water, Hiep added.
Ninety-eight percent of the delta's 13 million ruralresidents have access to hygienic water. Of that figure, 55percent have access to clean water that meets national standards,according to MARD.
About eight million rural residents in the delta have accessto water from 3,858 concentrated water supply projects, whilefive million rural residents use water from wells, bored wells,rainwater or other sources.
Seminar participants said that more investment was neededto build water supply projects and water reservoirs.
Luong Minh Quyet, director of Soc Trang province’s Department ofAgriculture and Rural Development, said that water shortages were causedby low rainfall and the low flow of the Mekong River during the dryseason.
The lack of funds for new water supply projects is another cause. Toprovide clean water to all households in Soc Trang province, more than 1trillion VND (43 million USD) is needed to build water supply projects.
To Quoc Nam, deputy director of Ca Mau province's Department ofAgriculture and Rural Development, said the province faces a similar situationand that rural residents live in scattered areas, which makes investing inwater supply projects more difficult.
Only about 18 percent of Ca Mau’s population have access to concentrated watersupply projects, the lowest rate in the delta, he said. The remaining userainwater or bored well water.
To reduce the exploitation of groundwater, Nam has petitioned MARD totake water from the Hau River, a tributary of the Mekong River, to CaMau. Ca Mau is the only province in the delta that cannot accesswater from the Mekong River./.
VNA
