THE ENVIRONMENT
entering the harbour is completed. As a prelude to the implementation of this scheme, the Water Pollution Control Ordinance has now been extended to cover the whole of the territory and strict control of polluting discharges is being exercised.
Comprehensive controls on the handling and disposal of chemical waste began in May 1993 with the opening of the Chemical Waste Treatment Centre and full implementation of the Waste Disposal (Chemical Waste) (General) Regulation. Hong Kong can now stop the widespread malpractice of dumping chemical waste into the territory's sewers and surface waters. The total amount of toxic metal discharged into Victoria Harbour was cut by 1 700 kilograms per day during 1996.
The Environment of New Towns
The recently developed new towns face some of the environmental problems as in the old urban areas. They have been better planned, with more open space, sewerage and waste disposal facilities, but water pollution persists in rivers, streams and the sea due to increased human activities. The inland and coastal waters of all new towns have now been declared Water Control Zones and discharges in these areas are controlled. Under the Waste Disposal Ordinance the keeping of livestock within the boundaries of the new town areas is banned. Also, sewers are being provided to previously unsewered village areas. These measures are slowly having an effect on the urban watercourses, the quality of which is steadily improving.
Rural Areas and the Sea
Many waterways in the New Territories are still severely polluted and some streams are no better than open sewers. This pollution poses a serious health risk to the public when it passes through villages.
Much of this pollution is caused by the territory's livestock industry. Before 1987, the 700 000 pigs and 12 million poultry produced a total of 840 000 tonnes of waste. This was equivalent to the pollution load of the raw sewage from more than 1.6 million people. Most of it ended up in Hong Kong's small streams and rivers and eventually, the sea. By the end of 1996, this load had been reduced to about 170 000 tonnes through controls under the Waste Disposal Ordinance.
Bathing beaches are an important recreational resource. To safeguard the public against swimming in polluted waters, the Environmental Protection Department has adopted strict E. coli (a bacterium) standards for water quality control in bathing beaches. These standards relate to the degree of faecal pollution and were devised after a very thorough study of the health risk facing local bathers. The following table shows how beaches were classified in 1995 and 1996.
Annual Bathing season geometric Health risk cases per Number of beaches beach rank mean of E. coli count per 1 000 swimmers
100mL of beach water
1995
1996
Good
up to 24
Undetectable
16
13
Fair
25 to 180
10 or less
10
14
Poor
181 to 610
11 to 15
13
10
Very poor
More than 610
More than 15
4
4
375