Description

According to the investigation of the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) in Vietnam on the behavior of people towards single-use plastic in nine coastal provinces and cities of Hà Tĩnh, Quảng Bình, Huế, Đà Nẵng, Quảng Nam, Phú Yên, Long An, Bà Rịa – Vũng Tàu, and Kiên Giang, the use of single-use plastic is still a common practice. Although the awareness of the impacts of plastic waste has been raised, the habit of using single-use plastic is not significantly reduced.

The WWF Vietnam states that the reduction of plastic waste is not only the responsibility of authorities and environmental protection institutions but also families. Therefore, it urges each person and family to be proactive in reduction of and find alternatives for single-use plastic products and services. Specifically, Vietnamese consumers can minimize plastic waste by following the 4T principle: Từ chối (refuse), Tiết giảm (reduce), Tái sử dụng (reuse), and Tái chế (recycle).

The WWF Vietnam mentions that every day 2,500 tons of plastic waste are released into the environment. The amount of plastic waste discharged into the ocean ranges from 0.28 – 0.73 million tons per year. Alone in 2018, Vietnam generated 31 million tons of domestic solid waste and approx. 5 million tons of plastic wastes. Plastic accounts for 64% of the materials used for packaging and this share is expected to be increased. Meanwhile, only 14% of plastic waste is collected mainly by waste pickers and recycled by small enterprises.

This information is from the interview of WWF Vietnam with the online newspaper VietnamPlus.

Sources & further information: “Giảm đồ nhựa dùng 1 lần: Việc cần làm ngay từ mỗi cá nhân, gia đình” at https://www.vietnamplus.vn and “Tham vấn kết quả nghiên cứu hành vi người tiêu dùng nhựa sử dụng một lần” at https://baotainguyenmoitruong.vn, accessed on 6 October 2021.