Scientists have suggested urgent measures to rescue the Dong Nai River by establishing rules for sustainable production.The scientists believe that there should be only eight industrial zones along the Dong Nai river valley among the 101 operational units. They have proposed not to license more craft villages, while it is necessary to gradually restrict the activities of the craft villages, or prohibit them.The scientists have stressed that it’s really urgent to take actions to not to cause any more pollution to the Dong Nai river valley.Thi Vai River cannot receive more wasteDr Tran Hong Thai, Deputy Director of the Science Institute for Hydrometeorology and Environment has warned that the whole Dong Nai river basin in11 provinces and cities can no longer receive waste water, because the TSS, COD, BOD, ammonia, total nitrogen and total phosphorus indexes have all exceeded the permitted levels.He said that if continuing receiving waste water, the river basin would be “dead absolutely” because of pollution. After considering the discharged waste water from different production workshops along the Dong Nai river valley, the research team has found out that six types of production activities have seriously polluted the river. These include rubber, paper, pulp, textile and dyeing production, footwear and tanning, metallurgy and chemical industries. The production workshops in the fields have been discharging big volumes of waste water to the river, most of which has not been treated.The 40 textile and dyeing establishments located outside industrial zones and on the river basin alone discharge 32,000 cubic meter per day. Meanwhile, 85 percent of the establishments still do not have waste water treatment systems, or run rudimentary systems. Most of them are located in HCM City, Binh Duong and Long An provinces.Meanwhile, the 103 rubber production factories on the river basin discharge 41,000 cubic meters per day to the river, and 22 chemical production workshops outside industrial zones discharge more than 10,000 cubic meters per day. 80 percent of the enterprises only have primitive waste water treatment systems, or do not have anything.Scientists have said that the highest alarming level should be rung for Thi Vai River. Waste water discharging to the river section from the Suoi Ca – Thi Vai river confluence to the My Xuan industrial zone, and to the canal system in the inner HCM City and Bien Hoa City must be prohibited.Currently, only the river section from the Saigon River to Dau Tieng reservoir can receive more waste water, while the other areas can only receive waste water at a low level.Water is a precious natural resource. In the context of water resources at risk of getting depleted, the accurate information about the quantity and quality of water resources is very necessary to serve as the basis for state management agencies to draw up the policies and strategies to protect water resources.Nguyen Thai Lai, Deputy Minister of Natural Resources and the Environment, on April 10 affirmed at a working session that the norms for the monitoring system for water resources would be build up by the end of the year.Striving to sustainable productionThe researchers have suggested temporarily prohibiting or restricting the production workshops on the Dong Nai river valley operating in the fields of pulp, basic chemicals, textile and dyeing. As for rubber latex processing workshops, it is necessary to say “no” to the factories that use backward technologies.All the 171 craft villages have to restrict their operation, while HCM City is leading with 59 craft villages that need investment restriction.Vietnamnet/ Source: Dai doan ket