* Dr. Nguyen Ngoc Sinh, President of the Vietnam Association for Conservation of Nature and Environment

This is a very important document in the way that once it is signed, it will pave the way for major progress in environmental protection activities in Viet Nam. This is also the first time that all three tasks of safeguarding natural resources, protecting the environment and responding to climate change have been put together under one single theme.

However, our association believes this document will be more solid if it highlights all three following points. First and foremost, it should demonstrate the inevitable, and in some cases decisive, role of the community. Safeguarding natural resources, protecting the environment and responding to climate change is a long and gruelling process that requires inter-sectoral and international efforts. Against such a backdrop, communities should be the main task force. Communities should be comprehensively informed and guaranteed under the law the legitimate right to participate in all stages of policy-making process, as well as evaluating and monitoring the implementation of such policies. There should also be efforts to build capacity for communities to empower them to make sound decisions.

Our second comment is on the question of human resources to accomplish these daunting tasks. Currently, the human resources responsible for such cross-cutting issues are quite limited and fragmented. There have not been environmental agencies that can fully exercise independent supervisory powers, separate from those whose activities have impacts on the environment. In the absence of such separation, the potential for conflicts of interests looms large. For example, the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development is responsible for protecting the forests but it is also this ministry that exploits the forestry products. For any ministry other than the environment ministry, it is so apparent that environmental protection is not their top priority. While environmental issues often require inter-sectoral co-operation, in reality, we have to admit that it is very difficult for ministries to work together on one single issue. Thus we hope that with this impending high-level document, it will bring co-operation among different agencies to a new level. We want the draft resolution to be very clear on the co-operation mechanism so that different stakeholders can work efficiently.

The third point we want the draft resolution to emphasise is regarding investment. It should be crystal clear about the numbers needed, stating the percentage of total GDP needed to solve environmental issues annually. We don’t need superfluous words, we need specific figures. We have talked a lot about how climatic extremes would cost us billions of dollars if we fail to prepare, so why don’t we invest more now to counter it? Meanwhile, the investment should not necessarily be confined to developing infrastructure, but also developing human resources. 

 

Source: VNS