Special edition  » The climate for change

Nguyen Thi Hong 54 years old, Tay Tuu commune,Tu Liem district, Hanoi

Over the past few years, winter seemed to become warmer and warmer but shorter and shorter, while the rainy season seemed to become longer and wetter.

Recently I heard via the media that this year’s winter will be warmer than previous years. If this happens, we will have to change our way of taking care of the flowers so we can meet the public's demand for flowers during the Tet festival. This change will be complicated, but not so costly.

In late October last year, Hanoi suffered from a big flood. In Tay Tuu, the rain totally submerged the commune’s nearly 350 hectares of flowers and rotted all the plants. My family’s 2ha of flowers was destroyed, resulting in a financial loss of nearly VND200 million ($11,000), which we borrowed from relatives and friends. Many said the flood was blamed on the city’s weak anti-flooding systems, but others also said it was due to the change in weather. I think both reasons are correct, but the main reason is the change in weather. I have never seen such persistent and heavy rain before. At this moment, we have still not paid off our debts.

We also don’t know what the weather will do in the remaining months of the year. If there is significant rain like in October last year, hundreds of flower-planting households in the village will face great losses.

I have several times heard the words “climate change”, but frankly speaking I don’t understand what it is. I only vaguely know that it is nothing but a change in weather, but its causes remain unknown to me. Local agricultural staff have several times reminded us to embank flower beds higher to prevent flooding during the rainy season, but they have never talked to us about climate change or helped us take the initiative in protecting our flower crops from natural calamities.

Dao Trong Thi National Assembly deputy

As you know climate change is recognised by rising sea levels and changes in sea currents. It has been tabled as one of Vietnam’s hottest concerns since last October, when a big storm hit Hanoi and caused great losses to the capital city’s people. Vietnam's climate is changing, with more strong storms attacking mountainous and coastal people.

In fact, this issue has already been researched and warned about for years by international scientists. With such warnings, I think the Vietnamese government needs to take climate change very seriously through long-term, effective and specific strategies to respond to and overcome climate change's impacts.

However, Vietnam’s climate change responses and strategies were belittled in the government’s 2010 socio-economic reports and agendas. I think the issue needs deep analysis with mitigation and responses, because climate change's aftermath will be far more serious than environmental pollution and destruction.

From now on the government needs to design more preferential policies for clean development mechanism projects to lure more investors into building infrastructure in natural calamity-prone and coastal areas. Also, National Assembly delegates, while discussing the country’s socio-economic development, should give greater voices to this issue.

I also know that during December, 2009 at the COP15 in Copenhagen, Vietnam’s climate change delegation will voice the country’s concerns. I wish to say that Vietnam, as a member of the international community and one of the countries to be hit most seriously by climate change, needs to express its clear awareness of climate change to the world. The country should also take more initiatives in enhancing its active role in the fulfillment of all international commitments and policies against, and responses to, climate change's impacts.

Developed countries, which have the most greenhouse gas emissions, need to be blamed first for damaging the world’s environment and ozone layer. Besides having to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, they should boost financial and technical support for poor and developing countries, which are suffering from what they have caused.

I don’t understand what climate change means. About five or six years ago, in my locality, there

Nguyen Minh 75 years old, Tien Phong commune, Quang Nam province

were five or six small storms per year without flooding. But there have been bigger storms over the past few years, with 10-12 big storms per year coupled with stronger winds and rainfall. Some years ago, even droughts appeared and lasted for months. We cannot understand why and how the weather could change so dramatically.

The recent storm number nine (Ketsana) swept the roof off my house and smashed my kitchen and drowned part of my rice fields. Prior to this storm, there were several small storms.

At present, I am living with my son’s family and in need of some loans to repair my house. My son’s family is also now living in poverty. Storm number nine destroyed more than 1 hectare of acacia forests. All the acacia trees were knocked down due to landslides and could not be sold because they were too small. So, the VND30 million ($1,700) we borrowed from relatives, friends and local funds turned to dust. Not only my son’s family, but also many other families in the commune, are now bogged down in big debt caused by that terrible storm.

We don’t have a TV or radio, so we can't find weather information. Sometimes, local staff visit families in the commune to ask them to take measures to cope with storms. The state has also supported us with some money to resume our daily production, but the money is negligible. We have to save ourselves first. We are in critical need of more support from the state to be able to continue production and save our livelihood.

Nguyen Thi Ut 52 years old, Bui Huu Nghia district, Can Tho

My hamlet is home to 83 households located on land in the middle of the Hau River. The households live on rambutan and mango orchards, as well as raising fish, cattle and poultry.

About 10 years ago, the weather here was cool and we never suffered from bad harvests. But over the past few years, the weather has seemed to get hotter and hotter and we have had crop failures for several consecutive years. The creeks have sometimes dried up and then been flooded, threatening our houses.

But, the most visible thing here is that river water levels have risen remarkably. I don’t know why this has happened. For example, the coconut trees in my garden are having their feet base flooded by 10 centimetres, while in the previous years, water levels were about 5cm from the feet base of the coconut trees.

Previous Octobers witnessed no rain at all, but this year’s October saw persistent rains with more rainfall than previous months. To cope with this, households here must build small dykes running around their gardens to protect against flooding.

Normally, in May every year, the rambutan trees begin to fruit. But this year, the trees fruited in July and August. Many trees have begun to show symptoms of some strange diseases on their trunks and leaves. We are now seeking remedies to cure them but we don’t know what to do.

My daughter is now living in the province's Vinh Thanh district, which is about 40 kilometres from here. She said her own family could plant only two rice crops per year, instead of three crops per year as the case was five or six years ago.

I see that the weather has become hotter and hotter, but sometimes it is colder than normal.

Tran Huu Tien 49 years old, An Phu Dong, District 12, Ho Chi Minh City

Many people in my locality have been asked whether they understand what climate change is. But, we don’t understand what climate change means. We only know that in the past, my family never used winter clothes. But now we, including young people, have to wear winter clothes as temperatures can fall a lot.

Some 15 years ago, the water level of the Saigon River, by which we live, was relatively low. But everything is quite different now. There used to be a fertile rice field here, but it has been turned into ponds and swamps. The water level at the lowest place is up to your knees because the river's water level has risen and is seriously polluted. Many families who used to plant rice have either moved into the city centre in search of another way of living or shifted to other jobs.

In many cases, the river flows into houses. I don’t know why the river has risen. It could be attributed to the city’s weak urban planning or the rising water levels of other rivers connecting with the Saigon River.

We have got accustomed to living here and have no other choice, but living with and adapting to river level rises. Many families have had to put sandbags at their gates and build firm walls surrounding their houses. But, poor families still often suffer from flooding as they have no money to buy sandbags and build walls.