The first meeting of the U3SAP Drafting Committee washeld in the Ministry of Construction (MOC) office, 37 Le Dai Hanh, Hanoion the 28th February, 2011. The meeting was chaired by Mr Cao LaiQuang, MoC Standing Vice Minister and Chairman of U3SAP DraftingCommittee, and attended by representatives at General Director level orequivalent from the Prime Minister’s Office as well as the Ministries ofConstruction, Planning and Investment, Agriculture & RuralDevelopment, Health; Natural Resources and Environment, Industry andTrade, Finance and Transport as permanent members of the DraftingCommittee. The meeting was also attended by Mr Nguyen Thanh Vinh,Country Team Leader of the Water and Sanitation Program/ World Bank(WSP/WB), office in Vietnam, together with other staff as funders of theproject.
Vice Minister Cao Lai Quang welcomed all members and guests to the meeting and stressed the importance of this technical support to the formulation of the unified sanitation sector strategy and action plan supported by a consultancy team from Grontmij Carl Bro (Denmark and Vietnam) to the Government and people of Vietnam.
Mr Vinh of WSP summarised the identification, development and purpose of the U3SAP project. The U3SAP project was conceived some years ago but only formally adopted by GOV in 2008 when MOC was identified as the coordinating ministry to formulate the strategy and action plan. And confirm serious commitment from WSP/WB to provide technical assistance to this important sectorial policies development initiative contributing to the sustainable WSS services in the future in Vietnam
The unified sanitation sector strategy will cover a period of 15 years plus whereas the detail action plan will be prepared on priority issues for the first 3 years or so. The strategy will cover all sub-sectors of sanitation in urban, peri-urban and rural locations, including domestic wastewater, drainage and solid waste, industrial, agricultural and other hazardous waste sources. However due to limited resources and time availability at present, the initial focus will be on domestic wastewater, drainage and solid waste in urban and semi-urban areas. Other sanitation strategies/programs/plans of different ministries and agencies which are completed/being done or planned in order to ensure that there are no overlaps or gaps. Current hot issues in Vietnam of climate change and water resource protection will also be given a focus in the formulation of the strategy. The final draft strategy is scheduled to be completed by the end of September 2012.
In his conclusion at the end of the meeting, Vice Minister Quang confirmed the coverage and scope of the work as well as approving the key milestones. The key issues to be addressed will be the coordination between ministries, sectors, provinces and an integrated, focused resource allocation to ensure that management of the sector can be carried out more effectively in future.
For further information please contact: Email: u3sap@gmcbvn.com or Tel: 04. 3978 5348./.