In the Proposal to issue the Prime Minister's Decision stipulating the roadmap for applying national technical regulations on emissions of motorbikes and mopeds participating in road traffic, the Ministry of Agriculture and Environment cited the number of motorbikes nationwide as follows:
From 2009 to 2023 nationwide, the number of vehicles increased mainly by personal vehicles. On average, the number of vehicles increases by about 10% to 15% per year, increasing rapidly in cities such as Ho Chi Minh City, Hanoi, Hai Phong, Da Nang.
As of December 2023, the number of vehicles registered for national management has been increased to 6,312,439 cars and 74,343,176 motorbikes.
For Hanoi city, the whole city has about more than 9.2 million vehicles of all kinds in operation. Of which, the city is managing more than 8 million vehicles of all kinds, including 1.1 million cars and 6.9 million motorbikes. In addition, there are about 1.2 million cars and personal motorbikes from other provinces.
Explaining the need to issue this decision, from a practical perspective, the Ministry of Agriculture and Environment said that air pollution in Vietnam in general and some large cities in particular tends to increase, mainly focusing on dust pollution, especially PM2.5 fine dust.
The air pollution situation nationwide has a legal nature in terms of time (the "season" of air pollution, in terms of time of day) and tends to increase in both space and time in large cities and urban areas such as Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City, especially the Hanoi Capital region in the last 3 months of 2024 and January 2025, there are many days in some times when the air quality index (AQI) has been recorded at "very bad" level.
Thus, it can be considered that the air pollution problem in Hanoi, Ho Chi Minh City in particular and other urban areas across the country mainly focuses on dust pollution, especially PM2.5 fine dust.
One of the main causes of dust and emissions causing impacts and air pollution is pointed out to be due to the large number of motor vehicles participating in traffic, including many old vehicles that do not meet emission standards and the age limit for circulation in the city, traffic jams and high traffic density.
According to a report by the World Bank (WB), the 2015 PM2.5 emissions inventory in the Hanoi area from transportation activities (mainly road) is about 15%, and road dust is 23%.
According to a release based on research data contributed by the World Bank to PM2.5 concentration in Hanoi in the period of August 2019-7-2020 from transportation-related sources as follows: Direct emissions from transportation contribute 12%, secondary inorganic emissions from on-site sources (constructed from precursors including transportation sources such as NOx) contribute 18%, dust (including road dust mixed with pollution from transportation, dust from construction and cement) contributes 17%.
Thus, the development and promulgation of the Prime Minister's Decision on the roadmap for applying national technical regulations on motorbike emissions participating in road traffic is really necessary to implement the newly issued regulations and control emissions.
According to the latest draft on the roadmap for applying emission standards, it is stipulated as follows:
Time to start implementing emission inspection of motorbikes and mopeds participating in road traffic:
From July 1, 2027 for Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City.
From July 1, 2028 for the remaining centrally-governed cities.
From July 1, 2030 for the remaining provinces. Depending on the actual situation, these provinces and cities can regulate the application of the deadline earlier.
