Landscape Analysis and Business Model Assessment in Fecal Sludge Management: Extraction and Transportation Models in Vietnam - Final report

Content - Summary

The purpose of this research is to inform the sanitation sector, for the purpose of informing more in-depth empirical research and/or investments by governments, donors and other development partners. A synthesis report from each region will provide analysis of wider patterns across countries. In the countries and cities where the work will be conducted, results will be structured to feed into discussion and debate at the local level among urban sanitation policymakers and practitioners, in order to develop a better understanding of this area of sanitation service delivery.

In Vietnam, three cities of Hanoi, Hai Phong, and Ho Chi Minh have been selected based on diversity of business approaches and models. In these cities, in-depth case studies will be conducted in order to better understand the full spectrum of urban sanitation service delivery models for the country. The selected cities include the capital city, a largest city, and one city with a population less than 1 million population. All cities selected have sludge treatment plants or official dumping sites.

At the public enterprise, in most of cases, to run FSM business is not making a profit. The company is running FSM as a ‘‘must do‘‘activity, which is often cross-subsidized by other activities of the enterprise, or subsidized by the city’s budget.

In the city of Hai Phong, scheduled fecal sludge emptying service for the communities is free of charge. Where wastewater fees is 15% surcharge on the top of the water bill, versus 10% of water bill in other cities, and all wastewater fee revenue is paid for the FSM management, the business does not make any benefit. The main reasons of loss are high annualized depreciation costs, and limited number of trips per truck per day which is much less than break-even point in the financial analysis.

All private FSM enterprises are making profits. However, in order to reduce running costs, most of them are practicing illegal dumping of fecal sludge, which is contributing to a serious pollution of the city environment and public health.

For emptying and delivery service, desludging expenditures, including running and depreciation ones, can be recovered by the competitive fees. However, fecal sludge treatment expenditures may not be recovered. Affecting factors here are selected technology for fecal sludge collection, treatment and reuse, and accepted market values of the compost product.

One of solutions to improve situation of the FSM service in the city is to give the right to run this business to the local public utility. The service is controlled by the city, and paid by the users. Besides direct payment for each time of desludging service, indirect payment through water bills, as part of wastewater fee, could be realized given that an Urban public works company will provide scheduled desludging for the users. At the same time, service based desludging is still available in the city by the public or private utilities.

Some solutions to improve sustainability of FSM business in Vietnamese cities are suggested as follows:

o FSM fees should be increased, or, cross-subsidized by other activities within the enterprise;

o Wastewater or solid waste management fees charged to the households which subjects also to adequate increase is among appropriate budget sources to cover FSM activities. Those budget sources could be used to cover scheduled emptying of fecal sludge for free (like HP.01 has been doing), or to pay to each m3 of sludge brought into the designated dumping or treatment sites. Appropriate awareness raising for the public and FSM enterprises, strict control in FSM activities in the city should be conducted;

o Using the same infrastructure for solid waste or wastewater management in the city for the FSM is a most feasible and sustainable solution in Vietnamese cities. The integrated waste management system may include at-source separation of wastes, co-treatment of sludge, organic waste and sewage treatment plant sludge for resources recovery through biogas recovery, wastewater reclamation, digested sludge utilization, etc. Utilization of the same infrastructure helps to economize investment and operation costs significantly where resource recovery brings more benefits.

Corresponding author:
Viet-Anh Nguyen
(Assoc._Prof._PhD)
Organisation: Vice Director, Institute of Environmental Science and Engineering (IESE), Hanoi University of Civil Engineering (HUCE).
Country: Viet Nam
E-Mail: vietanhctn@yahoo.com

Bibliographic information

Nguyen Viet Anh, Nguyen Hong Sam, Dinh Dang Hai, Nguyen Phuoc Dan, Nguyen Xuan Thanh (2011). Landscape Analysis and Business Model Assessment in Fecal Sludge Management: Extraction and Transportation Models in Vietnam - Final report. Institute of Environmental Science and Engineering (IESE), Hanoi University of Civil Engineering, Consultancy report commissioned by Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, Seattle, USA

Filter tags

Case studies in other formats East Asia & Pacific English Faecal sludge treatment processes Fundamental research and engineering Peri-urban

Download