ENG-2012 — Page 288

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The Environment

appointed green managers and publish annual reports of their environmental performance. Since 2007, all annual environmental performance reports incorporate, where appropriate, the principles of the 'Clean Air Charter' which the Government supports to improve Hong Kong's air quality. To further promote environmental performance reporting in the private sector, a dedicated EPD webpage encourages listed companies in Hong Kong to share their environmental or sustainability information with their stakeholders.

Sewage disposal facilities in the rural areas

Improvements continue to sewage disposal facilities in the rural areas of the New Territories and in 2012 the Government drew up plans to invest further in projects providing public sewers to convey domestic discharges from villages in rural and other un-sewered areas to sewage treatment works. Loan and grant schemes for eligible householders to connect houses to public sewers are available.

Cross-boundary Co-operation

Since environmental pollution transcends administrative boundaries, Hong Kong works together with Guangdong and Macao on environmental matters.

A Regional Air Quality Index publishes the results daily from a network of 16 monitoring stations established by the HKSAR Government and the Guangdong Provincial Government and reports on the monitoring results are released in April and October each year. There has been a substantial reduction in the average annual concentration of most pollutants in the region in recent years. According to the monitoring results of the Pearl River Delta (PRD) Air Monitoring Network, from 2006 to 2011 the average annual concentrations of sulphur dioxide, nitrogen dioxide and respirable suspended particulates in the region have decreased by 49 per cent, 13 per cent and 14 per cent respectively, amidst continuing growth of the economy in PRD region.

In November, the Hong Kong-Guangdong Joint Working Group on Sustainable Development and Environmental Protection endorsed emission reduction targets for 2015 and 2020 for the PRD region.

The Cleaner Production Partnership Programme encourages and facilitates Hong Kong-owned factories in the PRD region to adopt cleaner production technologies and practices, so helping improve the region's environmental quality. By the end of 2012, over 2,000 funding applications had been approved since the programme's launch in 2008. In addition, as at the end of 2012, 255 Hong Kong-owned enterprises had been commended under the Hong Kong-Guangdong Cleaner Production Partners Recognition Scheme, recognising their efforts in pursuing cleaner production. Hong Kong also works closely with Shenzhen to encourage the adoption of cleaner production practices by Hong Kong-owned factories there.

Hong Kong and Shenzhen are jointly implementing action programmes to reduce pollution of the adjoining waters, including Deep Bay and Mirs Bay. At the end of 2012, both sides commenced the second review of the joint programmes for Deep Bay to gauge their effectiveness and to draw up necessary additional mitigation measures. Meanwhile, Hong Kong and Guangdong are undertaking a joint evaluation of the pollution load carrying capacity of

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