ENG-2016 — Page 304

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The Environment

systems. The government provides a free livestock waste collection service, which collected about 23,000 tonnes of waste in 2016.

From the environmental protection perspective, livestock farming in urbanised Hong Kong is not sustainable. The government's voluntary licence-surrender schemes, introduced in 2005 and 2006, offers ex gratia payments for poultry and pig farmers respectively to cease livestock farming permanently. These schemes, together with a buyout scheme launched in 2008, have decreased the number of pig and poultry farms from 459 in 2005 to 72 by end-2016, and reduced pollution of the environment.

Sewage Treatment and Disposal

Victoria Harbour and Harbour Area Treatment Scheme

The public sewerage system serves 93 per cent of the population and collects about 2.8 million cubic metres of waste water daily. About 90 per cent of the collected sewage receives chemical or higher levels of treatment before being discharged.

The Harbour Area Treatment Scheme Stage 1 collects sewage from the urban areas of Kowloon, Tsuen Wan, Kwai Tsing, Tseung Kwan O and the northeastern part of Hong Kong Island, and transports it through a network of deep tunnels to Stonecutters Island for treatment. Stage 2A involves extending the deep tunnel system to take untreated sewage from the remaining parts of Hong Kong Island to the Stonecutters Island Sewage Treatment Works, which provide centralised chemical treatment for sewage from the entire catchment under the scheme. Since the Stage 2A project was commissioned in 2015, sewage from both sides of Victoria Harbour has been diverted to the Stonecutters Island plant for centralised treatment and disinfection before discharge. In early 2016, the government commissioned a consultancy study on further enhancing the quality of the harbour's coastal waters.

The government will spend $18 billion on sewerage schemes over the next five years, covering sewerage for rural villages. The Water Pollution Control (Sewerage) Regulation empowers the EPD to direct house owners to connect their waste water pipes to new public sewers. More than 10,500 village houses are now connected to the public sewers.

Sewage Disposal in Rural Areas

Improvements continue to be made to sewage disposal facilities in rural areas. In 2016, the government drew up plans to invest further in projects providing public sewers to convey domestic discharges from villages in un-sewered areas to treatment works. Loan and grant schemes for eligible households to connect houses to public sewers are available.

Sewage Charges

All water users who discharge their sewage into public sewers pay a basic sewage charge in accordance with the Sewage Services Ordinance. Twenty-seven trades and industries whose effluent strength exceeds that of domestic sewage pay a trade effluent surcharge reflecting the additional cost of treating their stronger effluent. These charges are used to recover the operation and maintenance costs of sewage collection, treatment and disposal facilities, while the government provides funds for construction.

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