Ha Tinh continues efforts to deal with consequences of Formosa incident

About 6,240 tonnes of rice have been allocated to 19,247 households while some VND23 billion (US$1.01 million) has been provided to 5,012 fishing boat owners.

Statistics reveal that more than 400 villages of 67 wards, communes and towns in seven districts, towns and Ha Tinh city were affected by the incident, with 6,000 fishing boats, 2,259 hectares of rivers and lakes, 31,692 cu.m of fishing cages and 127 hectares of salt fields subject to compensation.

The province has also issued policies to deal with the polluted marine environment, restore production and generate jobs.

Thanks to such efforts, Ha Tinh’s aquatic catch and aquaculture output reached 32,000 tonnes and 13,000 tonnes in 2017, representing year-on-year increases of 22.3% and 4.5%, respectively.

Responding to the province’s efforts to lure investments, many businesses have launched tourism projects in the locality such as Vinpearl-Cua Sot Resort, Quynh Vien tourism area, Xuan Thanh golf course and Dong Noi tourism area, helping attract more visitors.

Since the beginning of this year, thousands of tourists flocked to beaches in Ha Tinh. The Xuan Hai tourism area and the water park of Vinpearl-Cua Sot Resort welcomed more than 7,000 vacationers each day during the four-day National Reunification and May Day holidays.

In 2017, Ha Tinh served nearly 1.4 million tourists, up 25.6% compared with the previous year’s figure, of which 21,870 were foreigners, up 21.5% year-on-year.

At the same time, the province has helped locals fishermen change their job, with thousands of people assisted to work abroad.

The Formosa marine environment incident was first reported on April 6, 2016 massive amounts of dead fish washed ashore in Ha Tinh and then in Quang Binh, Quang Tri and Thua Thien Hue.

About 70 tonnes of dead fish were found in the four provinces and Thua Thien-Hue alone reported 35 tonnes of farmed fish had died.

The pollution affected more than 260,000 people who earn their living from the sea.

In June 2016, Formosa accepted responsibility for the fish deaths and pledged compensation to local fishermen and to help recover the polluted marine environment.