An international conference on paper recycling was held in the capital city of Hanoi on December 4 in an effort to seek opportunities to develop the industry.

The conference, jointly organised by the Vietnam Association of Paper and Pulp Producers and the Tetra Pak group, drew the participation of representatives from 50 domestic enterprises and experts from India and Thailand .

Participants focused their discussions on used paper recycling and paper packaging usage in Vietnam and globally, recycled paper demand in the country, paper production technologies and legal issues relating to the recycling of paper.

Dr. Vu Ngoc Bao, General Secretary of the Association, said that although the country needs more than 1.8 million tonnes of paper a year, domestic paper producers can only turn out 1.13 million tonnes, leaving the rest for imports. Vietnam also has to import a huge amount of waste paper as material for paper production due to the wasteful burning of used paper, the official added.

At present, only 25 percent of used paper in Vietnam is collected and purchased for recycling, ranking the lowest in Asia (the rate in Thailand is 65 percent; China , 31 percent; Japan , 61.4 percent; the Republic of Korea , 67 percent). There is no large-scale business working as used paper purchaser in the country.

Duman Ganga paper-mill Director Tushar Shar told the participants of his valuable experiences in recycling used paper in India and revealed that this could bring reasonable profit to enterprises.

Meanwhile, Tetra Pak Vietnam Communications Director Tran Hanh Dung affirmed that the recycling of used paper helps protect the environment and reduce CO2 emissions and that Tetra Pak is willing to help Vietnam ’s small- and medium-sized enterprises recycle used paper-boxes./.