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后 海 灣 引 入 沙 頭 角 海 海 水 計 劃 的 最 新 消 息
WWF Hong Kong has already expressed its serious concerns about the Shenzhen Government's proposal to 'clean up' Deep Bay by pumping brackish water from Sha Tau Kok Hoi into the polluted Shenzhen River that flows into the Bay. This is because the proposal will only dilute the pollutant that enters the Bay from the Shenzhen River and will not actually tackle the problem at source, that of reducing the total amount of pollutants being discharged from the catchment into the River.
As the Shenzhen Government intends to apply for financial support from the World Bank for this project, WWF Hong Kong has already written to the World Bank to express our concerns, and have also met with a representative from the World Bank who visited Hong Kong in late 2003.
This year, the Shenzhen authorities has contracted the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology (HKUST) to carry out an environmental review of the project, to identify the key impacts that the project may cause to the ecology of Deep Bay. A full EIA will be carried out in 2005.
As HKUST felt that they did not have the wide range of people with the necessary experience of the ecology of Deep Bay to write the environmental review, they asked WWF Hong Kong to be one of their sub-contractors. Unfortunately, the Shenzhen authorities only asked the HKUST to focus on the potential impacts of the proposed project on the endangered Black-faced Spoonbill that winters in Deep Bay, and the mangroves around the edge of the Bay. There are many other components of the ecology of Deep Bay that the review will not look into, such as the potential negative impacts on the hydrology and water quality of the Bay, the physical structure and area of the mudflat in the Bay, the diversity and abundance of benthic animals and fish in the Bay and thus, the many important migratory waterbirds that depend on those animals for food.
Despite our concerns with the principle of the project to flush water from Sha Tau Kok Hoi into Shenzhen River, and narrow scope of the environmental review, WWF Hong Kong feels that the organization has a positive role to play in the process by:
a) providing the best available data for the environmental review to show that there is a scientific basis for our concerns about the project,
b) ensuring that all the areas of concern that the environmental review omits will be included in the scope of work for the full EIA which will be undertaken later on, so that these concerns can be fully addressed during that later process.
During the course of the environmental review, it is proposed that three workshops will be held to provide information to, and collect comments from environmental NGOs, relevant experts and Hong Kong government officials concerning the project and the contents of the final draft of the environmental review. The first of these workshops has already been held in March 2004.
WWF Hong Kong feels that being a part of the team for the Environmental Review, will allow the organization to have a role in ensuring that the review process will be effective and transparent, and that the community's concerns are reflected and addressed in the final report.
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