Garbage operators have told Ha Noi authorities that the capital could disappear under a sea of garbage if they are forced to use garbage compactors to collect it.
They said that 1,500 tonnes of trash could pile up every single day because of the ban on the use of regular collection vehicles that hook the rubbish up in bins for disposal.
The prohibition, which comes into effect in April, faces strong opposition from waste collection companies.
According to Dinh Van Tien, director of Ha Dong Urban Environment JSC., the ban would strike hard at waste collection companies.
Their hooklift trucks, worth more than VND2 billion ($96,000) each, would be forced out of service because they were not registered for any other work. This would force operators to sell their existing small trucks that collects city trash.
Another problem was that existing refuse stations do not match-up with the compactors, Tien added. They were built for the hooklifts.
“For those reasons, when the prohibition is put into effect, our company’s many trucks and all those used by waste-services companies will end up as scrap,” he said.
Pham Thien Tai, president of Thanh Cong Collective, expressed similar concerns. Tai’s enterprise uses hook-lift trucks to collect 700 tonnes of rubbish a day.
“The new rule of the Department of Construction will force us to completely change our way of collecting and transferring refuse in all areas. This will be very time-consuming, complicated and costly as we must hire more workers, invest more in manual garbage collecting carts just like the old times. This is definitely going backwards,” he said.
According to Tai, eliminating hook-lift vehicles will lead to the return of long lines of three-wheeled manual collecting carts waiting their turn behind a giant green compactor.
He said it would also create traffic congestion, destroy city views and create environmental pollution.
Facing charges that the hook-lifts were responsible for dripping sewage and scattering trash on the roads, waste companies agreed that this did happen.
However, they said that since last October, all hook-lifts had installed equipment to prevent such problems. They even said that compactors were at the top of the black list for foul smells along the collecting trail.
To air their concern, representatives of waste-services companies have asked the municipal People’s Committee, the Soc Son district’s People’s Committee and Ha Noi Department of Construction to reconsider the ban.
