Hanoi Residents Experienced 38 Days In 2017 W. "Good" Air Quality; Avg. 4X Worse Than WHO Standards
KUALA LUMPUR, Jan 30 (Thomson Reuters Foundation) - Vietnam's capital, Hanoi, enjoyed little more than one month of clean air last year as pollution levels rose to match China's smog-prone capital, Beijing, preliminary findings of a new report showed.
Annual average air pollution in Hanoi in 2017 was also four times higher than those deemed acceptable by the World Health Organization's air quality guidelines, according to a report by the Green Innovation and Development Centre (GreenID).
And the situation is likely to get worse, according to the Hanoi-based non-profit organisation. "A bit more than one month were days with good air quality," said Lars Blume, technical advisor at GreenID, which analyzed air monitoring data compiled at the United States embassy in Hanoi. "It is out of people's control - they have to go out and work - and in many cases it is hard to really feel whether air is good or bad," Blume told the Thomson Reuters Foundation.
Air pollution in Hanoi is due to a number of factors, including a rise in construction works, an increase in car and motorcycle use, and agriculture burning by farmers, Blume said.
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http://news.trust.org/item/20180130032756-ovx1u/
