1 Waste management rapped
Damon Pang, The Standard, 10 March 2008

A new department should be set up under the Environment Bureau to oversee recycling issues, and Hong Kong should catch up on recycling domestic waste before contemplating building an incinerator.

The call was made after 28 environmental groups and scholars last week placed newspaper ads opposing the plan to build an incinerator either in Tuen Mun or Shek Kwu Chau, an outlying island.

Chinese University environmental science program assistant professor Chan King-ming said after RTHK's City Forum yesterday that the new department should be funded to promote and conduct actual recycling work. "The Food and Environmental Hygiene Department, which is responsible for recycling materials, has other things to do," he said.

He added the SAR is behind Taiwan and Japan in recycling domestic waste.

"A person in Taiwan, for instance, produces 0.6 kilograms of waste, domestic or otherwise, each day, while Hong Kong produces 1.35kg overall, and even counting domestic waste only, it would amount to 0.9kg," he said.

Environmental Protection Department deputy director Raymond Fan Wai-ming admitted at the forum that an incinerator would not be the once-and-for-all option.

"We have 15,700 tonnes of waste every day, of which 9,000 tonnes require processing," he said.

"But our proposal is to build an incinerator that could process 3,000 tonnes of waste, leaving some space for everyone to segregate waste at source, recycle and lower their amount of waste."

Hahn Chu Hon-keung, environmental affairs manager of Friends of the Earth, criticized the government's lack of determination in implementing waste reduction targets.

Greener Action executive director Angus Ho Hon-wai questioned whether the government's target of recycling 26 percent of domestic waste by 2012 was set too low.

2 Lack of vision' on disappearing landmarks
Una So, The Standard 10 March 2008

The Urban Renewal Authority's projects, from the demolished Wedding Card Street in Wan Chai to Sneakers Street in Mong Kok, have in recent years drawn strong opposition from local communities.

This has resulted in planners and academics warning the government to revamp the role and strategy used in revitalizing the city.

Lee Ho-yin, director of Hong Kong University's architectural conservation program, said the statutory body's existence "is fundamentally a contradiction."

"This is a conflict of interest," he said, adding that the authority's agenda should be to redevelop for the public good, and not to function like private developers to maximize profit.

The authority was established in 2001, with the government fronting HK$10 billion to carry out urban renewal.

With no further funding, the authority has to be self-sufficient through joint redevelopment ventures with developers.

Projects like the demolished Wedding Card Street and the proposed Sneakers Street project were criticized by residents and conservationists for destroying streetscapes and community networks. Lee said the current public participation involves only information sessions offering limited choices, and true public voices are not reflected.

Planner Peter Cookson Smith said the authority is taking an overly simplistic view on redevelopment, without sophisticated evaluation. "The current approach is not done with neighborhood sense. It should facilitate small-scale or incremental redevelopment," he said.

The Development Bureau will conduct a review of the urban renewal strategy in the next few months.

3 HK, Shenzhen urged to agree on border area
Mayor asks two cities to reach consensus on zone's development Denise Tsang in Beijing, SCMP 10 March 2008

The mayor of Shenzhen has made a push for Hong Kong and Shenzhen to come to a consensus over the development of the Lok Ma Chau Loop, a site in the restricted border zone straddling the two cities.

Xu Zongheng said it was time for Hong Kong and Shenzhen to work together on strategic planning for the two cities and that developing the area was an important part of such co-operation.

The two cities still had differences over the area's development, and it was time for a consensus to be reached on its use, he said yesterday on the sidelines of the National People's Congress meeting in Beijing.

Various plans for developing the Lok Ma Chau Loop have been put forward in the past 20 years, with suggestions including a free-trade zone, research centre, hi-tech industrial park and international financial services hub.

Chief Executive Donald Tsang Yam-kuen announced last year that the 96-hectare no-man's land created by the realignment of the Shenzhen River would be jointly developed by the Hong Kong and Shenzhen governments.

Mr Xu did not indicate his preferred option. "They all have their merits," he said. "But I think it is time for us to reach a consensus.

"The project is a very important part of closer co-operation between Shenzhen and Hong Kong."

Mr Xu's comments followed remarks by Guangdong Party Secretary Wang Yang and Governor Huang Huahua on Saturday on boosting ties between Guangdong and Hong Kong - especially those between the two border cities.

Plans to develop the area - which sits between the Lok Ma Chau and Huanggang checkpoints - have raised environmental concerns. The site is close to the ecologically sensitive Mai Po marshes and is heavily contaminated by toxic river mud.

But Mr Xu said a two-year environmental impact study had been completed. It found development of the area was environmentally viable.

The renewed push on the project comes at a critical time for Shenzhen, which is facing uncertainties as it undergoes a transition from a manufacturing to a service-led economy and new tax and labour laws are implemented.

Echoing Mr Tsang's proposal to bring the two cities together to create a world-class metropolis, Mr Xu said a recent agreement on jointly developing innovative industry marked a good starting point.

However, there was a need to increase dialogue between the two governments, he said. "It is time to work out together the direction of the cities' strategic development. Improvement in the communication mechanism on a governmental level is needed and will benefit bilateral strategic development."

Asked, meanwhile, if Shenzhen's overheated property market threatened to derail the city's economic development, Mr Xu said housing prices had come down since last October when a string of anti-speculation measures took effect. Shenzhen would regulate land supply by preventing investors from building up land reserves, he said.