Reducing air pollution from farmland: Building a straw market

Digital transformation to improve air quality

In November 2022, the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) officially launched the Viet Nam Pollution Reduction Project. The five-year project, with an estimated budget of 11.3 million USD, is implemented by Winrock International in collaboration with Viet Nam’s Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment.

The project aims to support Viet Nam in addressing environmental pollution challenges in target areas through a collective impact approach; promoting local initiatives and strengthening the capacity of partners to build local networks for mitigating key pollution issues in the country. This is considered one of the positive steps toward improving air quality.

In addition, remote sensing technology is being used to monitor air quality, while drones and sensor devices are deployed to detect pollution incidents such as the burning of straw and waste.

According to Dr. Hoang Duong Tung, Chairman of the Viet Nam Clean Air Network, a few years ago a private enterprise installed the PAMAIR monitoring system in both rural and urban areas to study the causes of air quality issues. The results showed one clear conclusion: burning straw is among the key factors affecting air quality. Whenever straw burning occurs, air quality indicators immediately worsen, and even neighboring areas are affected.

The PAMAIR system has almost disappeared due to a lack of maintenance funding. Later, a U.S.-supported project working with the General Department of Environment (under the former Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment) deployed similar sensors in several provinces, such as Hai Duong and Ha Noi, to collect air quality data. However, the pilot use of these sensors has not yet proven effective.

There are still obstacles to using drones to detect air pollution incidents: operating drones requires flight permits from competent authorities, and even when approved, remote control from a fixed position limits coverage. In practice, drones can only detect pollution at the end of the process, meaning incidents are found only after burning has already taken place.

Establishing a straw market for farmers

Dr. Hoang Duong Tung emphasized that the key issue is preventing farmers from burning straw, which requires early and proactive preventive measures.

"I think the sustainable approach is to find ways to support farmers to create a market that helps them realize that stopping straw burning and collecting straw is beneficial because there are buyers or market demand for it. Only then will they be willing to do it. If there’s no economic benefit and they have to spend extra money on collecting agricultural residues, no one will do it."

"We once worked with a suburban district of Hanoi to calculate a specific plan: based on the total rice cultivation area, how much bio-compost the district should provide to farmers. The cost turned out to be minimal. This should be seen as the responsibility of local authorities, not of individual farmers. Farmers should not have to pay out of pocket to buy biological agents for straw treatment," he said.

"We also proposed that communes and villages create Zalo groups to collect and track information on households engaged in rice cultivation right from the beginning of the crop season, whether they are planting or not, how much land they cultivate, and what support they need for farming, harvesting, and straw collection. The agricultural extension centers must regularly provide information and solutions, monitor the situation throughout the production cycle, and support straw collection after harvest.

They are also responsible for advising local authorities on technical measures, organizing collection activities, supporting the use of microbial products, and connecting with markets. In short, these are proactive solutions to provide early support, rather than relying solely on sensors or drones to inspect after incidents have occurred. This is also a form of digital transformation," Dr. Tung emphasized.

“What I want to stress is the need to shift from a reactive mindset, solving problems only after they occur, to a proactive one, emphasizing early and remote warnings with the help of modern tools. This approach will be far more effective for agricultural management, businesses, and farmers alike,” he said.

According to Dr. Hoang Duong Tung, proactive collection can also be implemented by having local authorities organize machinery rental to collect rice straw, and then use the proceeds from selling the straw to offset the equipment rental costs.

Agricultural extension centers are crucial in controlling, managing, and implementing the collection and treatment of agricultural by-products. We need a complete information and data system to build appropriate policies. Once that is in place, I believe full control and management will be achievable. Those are truly sustainable and effective solutions.

Reusing agricultural by-products brings multiple benefits, improving soil health, increasing productivity, promoting mechanization, and protecting the environment. When management agencies know in advance what crops farmers will plant in a given season, they can proactively plan for the collection and treatment of by-products from that crop. In today’s era, this is entirely feasible thanks to the availability of various supporting tools and systems.

Mr. Tùng shared: "I remember an incident where a dairy factory discharged wastewater onto the fields, causing the rice to grow too well - lush and green but never producing grain, a phenomenon known as ‘lush leaf.’ Farmers filed complaints, and we worked with both sides. Ultimately, the factory compensated all affected households for their lost harvest. The compensation amount was actually quite small.

From this story, I want to highlight that supporting farmers to stop burning straw, which affects others’ work costs. We shouldn’t treat it as a burden but rather as part of corporate responsibility. The environment is a shared space, and everyone must take responsibility and work together. We need to have data and information from land plots and cultivation areas to crop varieties and coordinate with farmers to plan how agricultural by-products will be handled after harvest. Having such a plan allows for effective management and treatment of agricultural waste in the farming sector.

Sensors and drones are only post-incident tools; they are not proactive measures to control emissions at the source, though they remain necessary. In the set of criteria for assessing new rural communes, there are also standards on environmental protection. Under the newly implemented two-tier local government model, commune-level authorities need to ensure these criteria are met and should have strong enforcement measures to handle environmental violations,” he noted.