Regional in-country perspectives: Hong Kong, China

Abstract

It wasn't until 1975 that urban planning andthe marine environment 'met' in the ColonyOutline Plan (renamed the Hong KongOutline Plan) and the setting up of theenvironment branch in government. Thiswas a time of rapid demographic andeconomic growth and a rapid decline in theurban environment. The usual clutch of problems included insufficient sanitationand sewerage, water supplies, inadequatehousing, squatter areas and so on.In 1995, the Marine Parks Ordinance waspassed, providing for the designation,protection and management of ecologicallyimportant marine sites. This landmarklegislation however is essentially theextension of urban zoning (or restrictive)land-use and control to specific marine andcoastal areas of scientific interest.However laudable such legislation hasbeen, Hong Kong's 6.9 million peopleinhabiting a highly urbanised area of 1,650sq km, share a fragile ecosystem strained byindustrial and urban development,pollution, landfills and reclamation all of which impact negatively on the marinehabitats. Furthermore with the inception of China's open-door policy and the rapideconomic, industrial and urban development in south China, humanpressures on marine resources and theenvironment are unprecedented.Even before the handover of Hong Kongto China in 1997, there have been attemptsto address common cross-borderenvironmental problems with theestablishment of the Hong Kong-Guangdong Environmental ProtectionLiason Group. In the same year as thepassage of the Marine Parks Ordinance inHong Kong, China promulgated the ChinaOcean Agenda 21 and initiated ICZM pilotprojects in Guangdong and elsewhere. TheHong Kong -Guangdong group established aseries of technical subgroups to monitorwater quality, pollution control, whitedolphin (Sousa Chinensis) conservation,fisheries management, aquaculture and redtide monitoring.The speed of Chinese legislation and policyframeworks devised belies the continueddegradation of the marine environment dueto rapid urbanisation and a sectoralapproach to the environment. WWF (andothers) have urged the Hong Kong government to ban trawling in Hong Kong'sterritorial waters, establishing 'no-take'zones, or instituting a licensing/permitsystem based on actual assessments of fishstocks. But the restructuring of marineactivities and the complex regulatoryregimes, differing customary and statutorylegal systems between Hong Kong andChina, will have to be addressed before the'one country, two systems' become one.