PUBLICATIONS, BROADCASTING AND FILMS
301
The publicity division works in close concert with the press division on major publicity exercises. A typical example of this sort of operation was the water crisis. There was little enough need to generate interest in the water situation and the press division was busy night and day supplying factual information about the storage situation, the distribution arrangements and the measures which were being taken by the Government to produce additional supplies. Throughout the year water has been front page daily news in the Colony's newspapers. Subsequent appeals for water saving were largely successful because they were made to a public already well informed on the general situation. These appeals were made through the newspapers themselves, on radio and television stations and by posters. The department produced special publicity material for hotels to explain the water situation to their guests. It also co-operated with other private or voluntary organizations in the Colony taking part in the community effort. One of these operations, which made philatelic history, was the competition sponsored by the Kaifongs, who offered prizes for water saving ideas. The department arranged for entries in envelopes with no other address but the two Chinese characters for 'Save Water' to be collected specially by the Post Office and delivered to the com- petition headquarters. In October, when it was obvious that water saving efforts could not be relaxed throughout the winter, a further impetus was given to the campaign by short, sharp, film appeals shown on both Chinese and English television services and in all cinemas throughout the Colony.
The cholera inoculation campaign, mounted on a full scale for the third successive year, was another example of a direct publicity campaign closely linked with a steady service of factual informa- tion about the course of the disease and measures taken to prevent it.
The department's overseas publicity during the year was associ- ated to a larger extent than before with the efforts being made by industry and the Government on behalf of Hong Kong's export trade. The department's normal output of films, feature material, photographs and publications is designed to create a broad general understanding of the life of the Colony. An event like the opening of the new Chinese University was taken as an opportunity to demonstrate the kind of progress which Hong Kong is making