Chapter 7: Primary Production and Marketing
LAND TENURE IN THE NEW TERRITORIES
SHORTLY after the New Territories were incorporated into the Colony a Land Court was set up to hear the inhabitants' claims to tenure of land, and all existing tenures thereby established were confirmed by the Hong Kong Government and recorded in a single Block Crown Lease. Such holdings are known as Old Schedule Lots. The Land Court completed its work in 1905. All land not recorded in the Block Crown Lease was deemed to be unleased Crown Land, leases of which could be sold at public auction, as in Hong Kong and Kowloon. New Territories lands thus acquired are known as New Grant Lots. Certain prescriptive rights over 'Crown Land' have, however, always been recognized either tacitly or by official acknowledgment; most villages have rights of this kind over a greater or smaller area adjoining them, where they graze their cattle, cut grass, and bury their dead; and no Crown Land in the New Territories is put up for auction with- out giving the nearest village or villages a chance to object. Such objections, whether on economic or geomantic grounds, are usually accepted if reasonable.
Most of the land in the New Territories is separately classified as either agricultural land or building land, and permission is required to convert land from one status to the other. Minor buildings, such as watchmen's sheds, pigsties, or other buildings definitely concerned with farming, are usually allowed to be erected on agricultural land. In cases where the owner of an Old Schedule Lot in agricultural status wishes to erect a small house of simple design, this is usually permitted without payment of a premium, provided the building will not interfere with any rural development or country town plan.
New Territories land policy follows the same general lines as that for the urban area, particularly in the towns and in areas required for industrial development. In the more rural parts the