XN000022-1996-05-08 — Page 53

End

32 -

The exceptionally high rate of growth in expenditure in 1994-95 was mainly due to the additional operating expenses required for commissioning new waste management facilities such as refuse transfer stations, strategic landfills and the Chemical Waste Treatment Centre. The full year effect of the additional expenditure is reflected in the 1995- 96 Revised Estimate, but such effect levelled off in 1996-97. We do not envisage new waste treatment facilities coming into operation in 1996- 97, although several new facilities will come into operation in 1997-98.

A clearer picture of environment spending is illustrated in the following figures which show the growth of total Public Expenditure on the Environment in Hong Kong as a percentage of the overall Hong Kong total Public Expenditure:

Revised

Approved

Estimate

Estimate

88-89 89-90 90-91 91-92 92-93 93-94 94-95 95-96

96-97

0.8% 1.5% 2.1% 2.5% 2.5% 2.0% 2.7% 3.2%

3.1%

(b)

-

The Government's environmental strategy is set out in the 1989 White Paper on Pollution in Hong Kong and in the subsequent biennial reviews of the White Paper. The 1989 White Paper set out a comprehensive 10-year strategy for environmental protection in Hong Kong and, in particular, targets such areas as waste, water, air and noise. More recently, the Government has established a Trading Fund in the Drainage Services Department and to which the Government has committed all the capital expenditure for a long term high priority programme of urgently needed sewage works around the central harbour. An overall review of our environmental programme was recently set out in the Third Review of the 1989 White Paper on the environment which also set out how environmental issues are taken into account when formulating policies; paras 2.63 and 2.64 of the Third White Paper Review explain the current arrangements for Environment Impact Assessment, particularly the Government's intention to make this process statutory; an Environmental Impact Assessment Bill was introduced in the Legislative Council on 31 January 1996.