PROJECT “VIETNAM POPS AND SOUND HARMFUL CHEMICALS MANAGEMENT” FINAL REPORT ON CURRENT STATUS OF POPS, PTS MONITORING AND POPS, PTS MONITORING DATA IN VIETNAM Hanoi, 2018 1 List of Contents ABBREVIATIONS .............................................................................................................. 4 1. General Introduction ....................................................................................................... 7 1.1. Introduction about POPs ............................................................................................. 7 1.2. Introduction to the project and its component ............................................................. 9 2. Objectives and Scope ..................................................................................................... 10 3. Methodologies ................................................................................................................. 10 4. Capacity of organization and management in POPs monitoring activities in Vietnam .................................................................................................................................................. 11 4.1. Assessment of legal documents on POPs monitoring in Vietnam ............................ 11 4.1.1. Environmental documents .................................................................................. 12 4.1.2. Documents in the field of agriculture and rural development............................ 14 4.1.3. Documents related to chemicals management ................................................... 17 4.1.4. Documents related to the health sector .............................................................. 19 4.2. Analysis and evaluation of the system of technical standard and regulations .......... 19 5. Review of international regulations and experience in POP monitoring ................. 20 5.1. Regulations of the Stockholm Convention ............................................................... 20 5.2. Regulation of European Union .................................................................................. 20 5.3. Regulation of United States Environmental Protection Agency ............................... 21 5.4. Learning from the global POP monitoring program ................................................. 22 5.4.1. Increasing quantity of new POPs ....................................................................... 22 5.4.2. Lack of technical capacity for POP monitoring ................................................. 23 5.4.3. Analytical capacities needed for POP analysis .................................................. 23 5.4.4. Inter-laboratory assessments .............................................................................. 24 5.4.6. Sample specimen banking needs......................................................................... 25 5.4.7. Financial difficulties for POPs monitoring ........................................................ 25 5.4.8. Manage, achieve, and retrieve data ................................................................... 25 5.4.9. Dealing with low detection limits in future monitoring ...................................... 26 5.5. Lessons learned from international experience research...................................... 26 6. Assessment for POPs monitoring data ......................................................................... 29 6.1. Rules for collection of monitoring data..................................................................... 29 6.2. General assessment for data ...................................................................................... 30 6.3. Preliminary assessment for temporal trend of POPs ................................................. 38 7. Assessment for environmental monitoring of POPs ................................................... 40 2 7.1. Sampling capacity ..................................................................................................... 42 7.2. Capacities for sample extraction ............................................................................... 44 7.3. Capacities for sample clean-up ................................................................................. 45 7.4. Capacities for quantitative analysis of POPs............................................................. 46 7.6. Technical staffs for POPs analysis ............................................................................ 50 8. Comments and recommendation for POP monitoring improvement ....................... 56 9. Recommendation for improving report to the Stockholm Convention .................... 59 9.1. For improvement of country report to SC ................................................................. 59 9.2. Recommendation for effectiveness assessment of SC .............................................. 60 10. References ..................................................................................................................... 62 LIST OF ANNEXES .......................................................................................................... 69 ANNEX 1: List of VIMCERTS certified laboratories for POPs/PTS monitoring and analysis ................................................................................................................................. 70 ANNEX 2: QUESTIONNAIR FOR POP MONITORING AND ANALYSIS .............. 107 ANNEX 3: SUMMARY MATRIX OF POP/PTS MONITORING RESULTS IN VIETNAM ......................................................................................................................... 113 3 ABBREVIATIONS ASTM American Society for Testing and Materials BAT Best Available Technologies BET Best Environmental Practices COP Conference of the Parties DONRE Department of Natural Resources and Environment EPA Environmental Protection Agency GEF Global Environment Facilities GMP Global Monitoring Plan MARD Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development MONRE Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment POPs Persistent Organic Pollutants QCVN Vietnamese national technical regulations QA/QC Quality Assurance/ Quality Control ROGs Regional organization groups TCVN National standards of Vietnam VEA Vietnam Environment Administration VILAS Vietnam Laboratory Accreditation Scheme UNDP United Nations Development Program UNECE United Nations Economic Commission for Europe UNEP United Nations Environment Programme WHO World Health Organization 4 SUMMARY The Government of Vietnam has ratified the Stockholm Convention on POPs in 2001. The Government has also developed, promulgated and revised Vietnam’s implementation plan on the Stockholm Convention. The plan clearly indicates Vietnam’s viewpoints and commitments to the international community on joint effort to safely manage POPs in order to protect the environment and community health. The project “Vietnam POPs and Sound Harmful Chemicals Management Project" aims to further reduce environmental and human health risks by reducing production, use and emissions of POPs and other relevant hazardous chemicals. The project is funded by the Global Environment Facilities (GEF) through the United Nations Development Program (UNDP) and implemented by the Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment for three years (2016 - 2018). Activity for assessment of POPs/PTS monitoring capacities in Vietnam as reported hereafter is a part of the Component 2 in this project. It should be noted that the purpose of POP monitoring activities is very diverse. It may be to achieve information on their levels in the environment, their levels of accumulation in animals, food chains or even their exposure level in people. However, the purpose of this assessment focuses more on issues relating to monitoring of POPs in the environmental compartments such as soil, sediment, water, air. This is a report that summarizes data as well as information from several individual reports, which are produced in accordance with the terms of reference for these activities. The assessment activities have addressed several issues as following: • Review Vietnam legal framework and regulations (governmental decrees, decisions, circulars, QCVN, TCVN) for (i) technical guidelines and standard methods for monitoring of POPs, (ii) their allowable levels in various environmental compartment, (iii) gap analysis and recommendations for improvement of the legal framework and regulation. Within the framework of this assessment, data and information from a number of researches on POPs have been reviewed and collected for demonstration of data mapping using website tools. Due to limitation of budget and time, this activity only selected 5 researches and publications officially published in peer reviewed journals. This approach may also ensure for more reliable and comparable data. • Overview international regulations and experience for environmental monitoring of POPs from the United States, the European Union and the global monitoring programs of UNEP. After adequate analysis of the relevant technical issues in the global monitoring programs (increase of new POP chemicals, instrumental capacity, inter-laboratory practice, etc) which are also relevant for Vietnam, useful recommendations are suggested for improvement of future POPs environmental monitoring activities in Vietnam. • Review networks of environmental monitoring laboratories in Vietnam to identify those with capacity for environmental monitoring of POPs. More details about capacity of such laboratories are assessed by reviewing database