As one of Vietnam’s largest cities, Hanoi’s rapid population growth and urbanisation in recent years have resulted in a significant increase in plastic waste, putting pressure on the city’s waste collection and treatment systems. Plastic recycling craft villages in Hanoi are facing severe pollution issues. Outdated and inefficient recycling technologies result in the excessive consumption of input materials, energy, and water, leading to low recovery rates and high volumes of waste. This has resulted in craft villages becoming significant hotspots for plastic leakage.

These guidelines aim to provide a framework for preventing recycling-related plastic and pellet losses and environmental leakage. The guidelines are useful for a broad spectrum of stakeholders, particularly policymakers and key plastic recycling actors, including informal waste pickers, junkshops, consolidators, and plastic recycling craft villages.

This guidelines is published by the Regional Resource Centre for Asia and the Pacific (RRC.AP) of the Asian Institute of Technology (AIT) with support from ERIA's Regional Knowledge Centre for Marine Plastic Debris under the project "Development and Dissemination of Technical Guidelines for Plastics and Resin Pellets Leakage Prevention from Factories and Informal Recycling Sector in the ASEAN".