It is easy to see dozens of boats excavating sand on the section of the river running through Thieu Toan and Thieu Vu communes. They blatantly operate at the daytime.
The unmarked boats often carry out transactions on the river.
It is easy to see dozens of boats excavating sand on the river
The sand excavation has resulted in serious erosion which runs for hundreds of metres along the river bank. Some areas at the river banks have become 10-metre deep holes.
Nguyen Van Thang, Chairman of Thieu Nguyen Commune, said that the commune had set up a task force with 13 members. The commune has built three observation stations and provided one patrol boat for the group. The members take their turns to do the duty.
“Every year, we spend hundreds of millions of VND for the task force operation which is aimed to deal with the illegal sand excavation. However, they find it difficult to detect violators. Since early this year, we only issued fines of VND13 million (USD590) for three violations,” he noted.
The sand excavation has resulted in serious erosion
According to Pham Dinh Lam, Chairman of Thieu Toan Commune, no local sand quarries have been licensed, so all the current activities are illegal. In April this year, two boats were fined VND3 million each for the violation.
Lam highlighted that boats often operate at noon or in the evening, while the number of police and authorities are small to cope with them.
Illegal sand excavation is common at rivers in Hanoi. In the first 10 months of last year, the municipal police discovered 151 cases of illegal cases involving 191 people. They were fined a total VND2.8 billion (USD125,000).
