TNAG-1842-FCO40-2617-House-of-Commons-Select-Committee-on-Foreign-Affairs-enquiry-1989 — Page 23

30. Very considerable sums have also been spent over the years on port and airport development. The port of Hong Kong loads and

discharges almost 80 million tons of cargo a year, more than double

the amount handles in 1980. The container port at Kwai Chung is now the busiest in the world in terms of throughput and there have also

been rapid increases in the shipment of non-containerised cargo.

This has been largely brought about by the explosive growth in the

re-export trade in recent years and the transhipment of increasing amounts of Chinese imports and exports through Hong Kong.

31. Hong Kong International Airport is now the second busiest in

Asia. Over the past two years passenger movement has increased by

40% and aircraft movement and freight traffic by around 30%. The

present airport will reach the limit of its capacities sometime in

the 1990s. Serious consideration is being given to the building of

a new airport, at a cost estimated at HK$40,000 million (over £3,000

million).

32. Other large public utility investments include electric power

stations, the water supply and telecommunications. The two

privately owned, but government regulated, electricity companies

have each built large new generating stations in the past decade

which can be run on either coal or oil. The complex at Tap Shek Kok

in the North West New Territories, when fully completed next year,

will have a total capacity of 4,000 megawatts, making it one of the

largest in the world. Hong Kong also plans to buy up to 70% of the electricity generated from the nuclear power station at Daya Bay in China now being built by a Chinese/Hong Kong joint venture company.

33. Continuous investment has also been necessary to meet the

territory's ever increasing demand for water. Until the early

1980's the greater part of the supply came from a series of

reservoirs and associated catchment areas constructed within Hong

Kong itself. Today, however, more than a half of Hong Kong's water supplies are bought from China but investment in large treatment and

distribution works is still required in Hong Kong itself.

Responsibility for water supplies lies with the government's Water

Supplies Department.