Pupils in central region get support following environmental incident

VGCL President Bui Van Cuong led a delegation to Quang Binh on September 5 to hand over the sum to representatives from the provinces, aiming to help local students and teachers overcome difficulties deriving from the incident. The money will be used to support teachers, present scholarships to students, and drill wells in affected localities. Cuong said he hopes the support will contribute to stabilising the lives of teachers and students, helping them continue pursuing the teaching and learning cause. In the same day’s morning, the VGCL President and Secretary of the Quang Binh provincial Party Committee Hoang Dang Quang attended a ceremony to kick off the new school year and presented gifts to teachers and students in the centre for educating disable children in Quang Trach district. In earlier April, massive fish deaths were reported along beaches in the four provinces.

Initial statistics from the provinces reported some 277 tonnes of dead fish – both washed up on the beaches and farmed from the sea, causing estimated economic losses totaling more than US$11.5 million.

Further, at least 123,000 fishermen and locals who rely on the sea for a living or who work in the tourism industry were severely affected by the incident. This has not taken into account the damage to the local environment.

On June 30, Hung Nghiep Formosa Ha Tinh Steel Limited Company, after admitting its link to the fish deaths, offered a total compensation of  US$500 million, which will be used to support local fishermen to switch to other jobs and recover the polluted maritime environment.