28 April, 2004

Dear Mr. Leung,

Thanks for your letter. We welcome any complaints from tourists. Looking back on your letter, you had mentioned that the water was seriously polluted and it was very dirty in Hong Kong. Furthermore, some of the beaches such as in Causeway Bay were filled of rubbish and it smelled strangely. For that, I’m going to tell you what the Government has been doing to solve those problems.

First of all, it is clear that there were too much rubbish floating on the sea in the past. However, the Government has been cleaning up Victoria Harbour. It has been spending more money on this problem than on any other environmental problem. The amounts of the pollutants such as plastic bags, plastic bottles and bits of polystyrene have been decreased. It is much better now. Although the issue hasn’t been entirely solved, the Government would keep on making an effort to completely settle it.

Moreover, for the problem of untreated sewage, the Government opened a new sewage treatment works on Stonecutter Island in 2001. It deals with 70% of the untreated sewage. Therefore, pollution levels have fallen especially in the eastern part of the harbour, although there are still problems with untreated sewage in a few other areas. We are sure that the problem of water pollution would be worked out soon.

In addition, to talk about the problem of red tide, we should know the main cause of red tide is the changes in weather. Many beaches are likely to be more polluted after heavy rain and red tide may more easily occur. Nevertheless, the problem of red tide has become less serious over the past few years. The sightings of red tide were 43 in 1988, but it was reduced to 16 in 2000. It is really a big success. We expect it would become less and less.

Besides, the Government has been taking further actions to tackle water pollution in Hong Kong. Firstly, our Government and officials in Guongdong have agreed to work together to clean up the sea around Hong Kong over the next 20 years. Secondly, it has set some laws to avoid citizens from throwing rubbish into the sea and tell polluters to make sure that all toxic waste should be treated before it is dumped. And the Government has been inspecting factories over the past few months to make sure that they do treat their waste. Lastly, the Chemical Waste Treatment Facility on Tsing Yi was set up in 1993.

All in all, the Government has done a lot to protect our environment. Especially for the water pollution problem, our Government has been making an effort to solve it. In the future, we believe the water pollution problem would be completely solved eventually.

If you have any further comments, please write back and let us know.

Yours sincerely,

Chris

Assistant officer of Hong Kong Tourism Board