HCM City struggles to deal with abandoned rubbish containers.
On November 19, the Saigon Port's Border Gate Custom Department announced that 1,500 containers of various types of rubbish are being left idle at Cat Lai Port. 1,000 of which must be re-exported as they failed to meet environmental protection requirements. Many containers arrived over 90 days ago but haven't been claimed by anyone.
Nguyen Thanh Long, vice head of Saigon Port's Border Gate Custom Department Area 1 said the majority of the rubbish is plastic waste. They also faced many difficulties with bureaucracy and abandoned containers. It often takes one to two days to inspect a container.
30 firms with over 1,000 rubbish containers were asked to re-export. However, only 19 firms have replied and have plans to re-export 653 containers.
According to Long, some environmental protection regulations should be adjusted to prevent illegal rubbish imports.
Saigon Newport Corporation, manager of Cat Lai Port, said the rubbish containers are badly affecting the port and pose a risk of pollution. They had to relocate some containers to other ports to avoid congestion and overloading.