Vietnam lacks control over non-fired brick quality despite the large number of such bricks produced in the country over the last five year, the Ministry of Construction said.
A non-fired brick production line in Hai Phong city (Photo: baoxaydung.com.vn)
Hai Phong(VNA) – Vietnam lacks control over non-fired brick quality despite the largenumber of such bricks produced in the country over the last five year, theMinistry of Construction said.
Most of the non-firedbrick manufacturing enterprises evaluate their product quality by themselvesbased on Chinese and Korean standards, according to Do Tien Thinh, an expertfrom the Vietnam Institute for Building Science and Technology under theconstruction ministry.
Vietnam had notdeveloped national standards for the processes of designing, producing,inspecting and testing of non-fired bricks, he said at a conference onevaluating the first phase of a national project on increasing the productionand use of non-fired bricks in Hai Phong City last week.
His remarks weresupported by a representative from the Vietnam Concrete Association, whostressed the importance of having uniform quality standards to stabilise thenon-fired bricks’ price.
According to Nguyen XuanBinh, Vice Chairman of the city’s People’s Committee, the traditional redbricks remain a consumer favourite.
Even though the unitprice of non-fired bricks is higher than of red bricks, the total cost of aconstruction built with non-fired bricks, from the design to the constructionphase, is lower than the one built with traditional bricks, he said.
Approved by the PrimeMinister in 2010, the project is aimed at increasing the percentage ofnon-fired bricks to 40 percent of the total number of bricks produced in thecountry by 2020, as well as reducing the amount of greenhouse gasemission.
Some 250 non-fired brickproduction lines must be developed nationwide in order to reach the objective,said Deputy Construction Minister Tran Viet Thanh.
Five billion non-firedbricks were produced in the country last year, accounting for 24 percent of theyear’s total quantity of building materials, according to reports from theconstruction ministry.
The number helped save8.5 million sq.m of clay, some 825,000 tonnes of charcoal and reduced 3.1 tonnesof CO2 emission, according to the reports.
The project hasdeveloped training programs on non-fired technologies and provided training for350 brick manufacturers from 24 provinces and cities across the country thisyear.
Thai Nguyen province, HaiPhong City and Da Nang City were selected to demonstrate the technology ofvibration with hydraulic pressure in non-fired brick manufacturing. Theirproducts have been used in several buildings.-VNA
The Prime Minister has approved the project “Promotion of non-fired brick (NFB) production and utilisation in Vietnam”, funded by the Global Environment Facility (GEF).
The Government is urging construction companies to use unbaked bricks in place of traditional bricks, the production of which cuts into agricultural land and pollutes the environment.
The production and sale of construction materials from the beginning of this year are quite favourable with stable prices, the Construction Materials Department evaluated.
Results and experience from a project on increasing the production and use of non-fired bricks were introduced at a workshop held in the northern province of Thai Nguyen on June 10.
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A non-fired brick production line in Hai Phong city (Photo: baoxaydung.com.vn) 
