December’s events have placed GIFT on the platform to improve air quality in Hong Kong’s streets and roads. On 17th December 2007, Chandran Nair and Thomas Tang participated at a public summit to announce the results of Hong Kong’s stakeholder engagement exercise run by the Council for Sustainable Development through which over 80,000 individuals expressed their concerns on the parlous state of Hong Kong’s air quality.

Hong Kong’s air pollution problems reached worldwide notoriety when Time Magazine featured a smog clad IFC Tower on the cover of its December 2004 edition entitled “Bad Air Days”, a possibly unintended pun on Hong Kong’s posturing as the glamorous “Asia’s world city”. High air pollution levels have caused many international companies to reconsider locating to the city due to concerns of expatriate staff for their families. Unsurprisingly, Hong Kong’s government has focused much attention on this issue but more surprising was the national premier Hu Jintao’s November advice in a rallying call in Beijing to Hong Kong’s leadership to maintain a good environment as a priority.

At the summit, topics such as road pricing, demand side management and air pollution alerts were the subjects of discussion. Cities like London and Singapore have shown that charging road users yields positive benefits, and Hong Kong, based on the stakeholder responses, now looks ready to follow this trend – hitting polluting motorists where it hurts, in the pocket. Managing energy demand in the “city of lights” further looks like becoming a reality – will Hong Kong overtake others in achieving carbon neutrality by becoming less profligate in its use of electricity? This coupled with how much air pollution could be avoided if measures were mandated was on the summit agenda for discussion. Lastly, how harmful is breathing Hong Kong’s air? The use of colour codings on public announcements to alert members of the public seems to be the popular choice of stakeholders according to the survey carried out by the Centre for Social Services Research of Hong Kong University. What did people think about Hong Kong halting traffic or banning outdoor events on days of high air pollution? The results can be seen on www.susdev.org.hk.

Chandran Nair over the past 12 months has been convening the Support Group which has been advising the Council for Sustainable Development on air quality issues. At the summit, Nair urged the Hong Kong Government not to hold back on tackling air pollution, imposing mandatory measures if needed. “Voluntary actions are well-intended but are ineffective in changing the way we operate,” he said, “it is only through mandating measures [like energy efficiency] and enforcing the polluter pays principle will we achieve better air quality”.

The Chairman of the Council, Dr. Edgar Cheng, in his summit speech, stressed the urgency to act, adding that “a mix of incentives, mandatory requirements, market-based approaches, and public funding” was needed but that being said any proposed measures must be fair and not impinge unduly on livelihood issues. He reiterated Nair’s line that voluntary action was not enough and went so far as to suggest that a “superfund” be set up to provide the financial resources for the purpose of dealing with the air problems. GIFT’s Thomas Tang is currently working with the Council to take this notion forward.