Entities subject to payment of environmental protection fees on wastewater in Vietnam from July 01, 2020

According to Article 4 of Decree No. 53/2020/NĐ-CP of Vietnam’s Government, organizations, households and individuals discharging wastewater specified in Article 2 hereof shall pay environmental protection fees on wastewater.

However, if an organization, household or individual discharges wastewater into a centralized wastewater treatment system and has paid the entity managing and operating the centralized wastewater treatment system for wastewater treatment services based on the service charge bracket, the entity managing and operating the centralized wastewater treatment system shall pay environmental protection fees on wastewater as prescribed in this Decree (except for the case specified in Clause 7 Article 5 hereof).

If the facilities specified in Clause 2 Article 2 hereof use water supplied by a clean water supplier for their manufacturing and processing, the facility owners shall pay environmental protection fees on industrial wastewater (and shall be exempt from environmental protection fees on domestic wastewater).

Besides, the environmental protection fees in Decree No. 53/2020/NĐ-CP are charged upon industrial wastewater discharged into water bodies as prescribed by law and domestic wastewater, except for the cases of exemption specified in Article 5 hereof.

Industrial wastewater refers to wastewater from factories and manufacturing and processing facilities (hereinafter referred to as “facilities”) of organizations, households and individuals, including:

- Facilities that manufacture and process agricultural, forestry and fishery products, food, spirits, beer, soft drinks and tobacco.

- Livestock facility that houses cattle and poultry on farms in accordance with regulations of law on livestock production; cattle and poultry slaughterhouses.

- Aquaculture facilities that are required to prepare environmental impact assessment reports or environmental protection plans as prescribed.

- Handicraft workshops in handicraft villages.

- Leather recycling, tanning, textile and dying facilities.

- Mineral mining and processing facilities.

- Facilities manufacturing paper, paper pulp, plastics and rubber; electronic and electrical equipment and parts.

- Mechanical workshops; metallurgical facilities; metal processing facilities, machinery and component manufacturers.

- Scrap processing facilities, shipbreaking facilities and ship cleaning facilities, waste treatment facilities.

- Facilities manufacturing basic chemicals, fertilizers, pharmaceutical products, agrochemicals, building materials, office supplies and household appliances.

- Clean water supply plants, power plants.

- Centralized wastewater treatment systems in urban areas.

- Centralized wastewater treatment systems in industrial parks, industrial clusters, export-processing zones, economic zones, fishing ports, hi-tech zones and other areas.

- Other manufacturing and processing facilities that generate wastewater from manufacturing and processing activities.

Moreover, domestic wastewater refers to wastewater generated from activities conducted by:

- households, individuals.

- regulatory agencies, public service providers, people’s armed forces, other organizations (including places of management, branches and offices thereof), except for manufacturing facilities and processing facilities affiliated thereto.

- Facilities cleaning and repairing automobiles and motorcycles.

- Health facilities; restaurants, hotels; training and research institutes.

- Other businesses not specified in Clause 2 Article 2 of this Decree.

View details at Decree No. 53/2020/NĐ-CP of Vietnam’s Government, effective from July 01, 2020.

Thu Ba

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