1

Fourth Meeting of the

Awareness, Mainstreaming and Sustainability Working Group

Confirmed Minutes of Meeting

Date : 24 January 2014 (Friday)

Time : 2:36 – 5:02p.m.

Venue : Room 701, Agriculture, Fisheries and Conservation Department, 7/F,

Cheung Sha Wan Government Offices, 303 Cheung Sha Wan Road,

Kowloon

Attendance

Convenor

Dr WONG Fook-yee

Members

Mr CHEUNG Chi-wah

Mr JOR Chi-keung, George

Mr Samuel KWONG

Dr LAU Chee-sing

Dr LAU Wai-neng, Michael

Ms LAU Yuen-yee, Vicky

Dr LEE Wai-ying, Joanna

Dr NG Cho-nam, B.B.S., J.P.

Mr SO Kwok-yin, Ken

Mr TAM Man-kei

Mr TAM Po-yiu

Ms WONG Lai-yin, Idy

Ms YIP Yan-yan

2

Mr CHAN Yiu-keung

Assistant Director (Conservation),

Agriculture, Fisheries and Conservation

Department (AFCD)

Mr WONG Yung-hing, Eric Executive Director (Hong Kong

Wetland Park), AFCD

Dr PAU Ka-wai

Senior Agricultural Development

Officer, AFCD

Secretary

Dr MOK Siu-yan, Flora Conservation Officer (Biodiversity) 5,

AFCD

In Attendance

Prof. LAM Kin-che, S.B.S., J.P. Chairman, BSAP Steering Committee

Ms LOH Kung-wai, Christine, J.P.

Under Secretary for the Environment,

Environment Bureau

Mr CHAN Kin-fung, Simon

Senior Conservation Officer

(Biodiversity), AFCD

Mr CHAN Ho-pang, Felix

Conservation Officer (Special Duty)2

Ms TONG Yee-fun, Pauline

Country Parks Ranger Services Officer

(East)

Absent with Apologies

3

Mr LAI Chuen-chi, Patrick

Senior Country Parks Officer / Ranger

Services, AFCD

Mr Ruy BARRETTO

Mr CHING See-ho, Ken

Ms Suzanne GENDRON

Ms Sophie LE CLUE

Mr LI Kwok-ying, B.B.S., M.H., J.P.

Mr PANG Siu-kei

Ms YAU Lai-ping, Pansy

Mr Paul ZIMMERMAN

Welcoming Message

The meeting was commenced at 14:36pm. The Convenor welcomed the Chairman and the

Vice Chair of the Steering Committee and other members who attended this meeting for the

first time.

Agenda Items

Action

I. Confirmation of Minutes of the 3rd Meeting held on 7 November

2013

2. The Convenor said that the draft minutes had been circulated to

members on 20 December 2013. After incorporating the minor

comments received, the revised draft was circulated again on 8 January

2014. As no further comment was received, the minutes of the 3rd

meeting were confirmed.

(Post-meeting note: the confirmed minutes of the 3rd meeting had been

circulated to members for record on 29 January 2014.)

II. Matters Arising

4

Action

3. The Secretary, Dr Flora MOK, briefed members on the overall

progress of BSAP development, matters arising, the multimedia library

on the BSAP webpage and the file sharing website to be launched.

4. Mr Ken SO enquired the number of attendees in the first public

lecture held on 18 January 2014. Dr Flora MOK replied that the first

lecture was a full house with 280 attendees. Mr Simon CHAN

supplemented that he would brief members about the feedback

received under AOB.

III. Progress Report by the Focus Group on NGOs

5. Ms YIP Yan-yan, leader of the Focus Group for NGOs, provided an

overview of the existing approaches adopted by environmental NGOs on

awareness-raising, and took members through the gaps identified. She

also introduced the next steps of the Focus Group.

6. The Convenor thanked this Focus Group for making progress, and

suggested the Secretariat to upload the Inception Report to the File

Sharing Website.

(Post-meeting note: the Inception Report of the Focus Group on NGOs

was uploaded to the File Sharing Website on 30 January 2014.)

The Secretariat

7. Prof. LAM Kin-che shared his observation that while some citizens

were passionate about conservation, many others were not familiar with

this topic. He asked what the NGOs could focus on in their work, where

limited resources should be placed, and what platforms would be most

appropriate to carry out the work. In response, Ms YIP Yan-yan said

that while NGOs were mainly supporting the conservation work in the

society, the Government could provide more resources to support them

to explore new initiatives. In particular, NGOs that had not been

focusing on biodiversity conservation would need extra funds to take up

the new job on promoting BSAP. The NGOs also wished to have a

common platform to share information and to better coordinate work

5

among themselves.

Action

8. Ms Idy WONG asked how mainstreaming of BSAP among NGOs,

especially non-environmental NGOs which are the majority, could be

done. Ms YIP Yan-yan replied that messages about BSAP could be

radiated through various organisations, in which the receiving

organisation would further spread the message to its connections. She

reiterated that a common file sharing platform would aid the flow of

ideas between Working Groups and Focus Groups and could minimise

overlapping of efforts.

9. Dr NG Cho-nam supported the suggestion that NGOs could take up

the promotion of BSAP through their networks. He shared a successful

case of promotion through the Hong Kong Scout Association (HKSA).

He pointed out that this organisation was experienced in campaign

management and they had a huge network of members. He suggested

environmental NGOs to partner with groups similar to the HKSA to

maximise their outreach in promoting BSAP. Mr Ken SO suggested that

the Hong Kong Council for Social Service (HKCSS) could also be

approached. The HKCSS was set up to train social workers or NGOs

with different skill sets, and would welcome collaborations to deliver

conservation-relevant trainings to social workers. Collaborating with

HKCSS could also serve as a springboard to mainstream biodiversity into

the social service sector.

10. Mr Simon CHAN supplemented that the Environmental and

Conservation Fund had been an existing funding source for projects

relevant to conservation. He added that if Focus Groups wish to meet

with Government Departments to discuss about BSAP, the Secretariat

could serve as a contact point and could help provide a venue for

meeting.

11. Ms Christine LOH remarked that the focuses in different stages of

BSAP formulation and implementation should be different. At this

stage, efforts should be focused how to outreach to more people and get

feedbacks; another stage would be the plan-making stage, during which

6

the Working Groups would have debated and recommended to the

Steering Committee proposals to engage the public in the conservation

of biodiversity in the long run. As these proposals remained

plans-in-the-making, Working Groups should focus on finding out how to

reach out to the public to promote the coming of BSAP. The Convenor

said that awareness-raising remained one of the main focuses of this

Working Group, and the Working Group would also need to prioritise its

work in view of the limited time and resources.

Action

12. Mr TAM Po-yiu suggested public organisations might have a role to

play in promoting BSAP given their connections with the Government,

and their involvement in many aspects of the economy. It might be

beneficial to secure their buy-in. Dr NG Cho-nam shared an

observation that having the common birds of Hong Kong printed on

stamps could enhance public appreciation of the local biodiversity. He

suggested that organisations similar to the Hongkong Post could be

approached for promoting BSAP.

13. Mr CHEUNG Chi-wah asked whether Focus Groups should further

integrate their promotion efforts to ensure good coverage of all target

receivers. The Convenor commented that such integration could be

explored at the next stage.

14. Dr NG Cho-nam shared another case of collaboration between the

HKSA and the Hong Kong Bird Watching Society to survey for biodiversity

around their campsite in Sai Kung, and the survey data was used for

biodiversity education for visitors. He suggested that similar

collaborations could be explored to leverage the expertise of

environmental NGOs and the resources of youth organisations. Ms

Christine LOH concurred that similar partnerships should be encouraged,

and proposed that the Government could work with other groups to host

events. This could be an indirect way of reaching out to a potentially

larger number of participants through youth organisations other than

directly giving lectures to the public.

15. Mr TAM Po-yiu remarked that the Government could directly or

7

indirectly support conservation projects, as long as there were clear

criteria of selection, and the partnering organisations were trusted

and/or experienced in relevant arenas. He opined that these

partnerships could promote BSAP at the formulation stage, and they

could serve as models for future collaborations at the implementation

stage. Ms Idy WONG concurred that such partnerships should be

further explored and they should start early. Partnering with

non-environmental NGOs could help reaching out to those who might be

relatively unfamiliar with biodiversity conservation, which was the group

to be targeted at for successful mainstreaming of biodiversity

conservation in the society. Mr CHEUNG Chi-wah pointed out that it

would be essential to introduce BSAP to citizens who were normally out

of reach by the environmental NGOs, so as to better prepare them for

the public consultation of BSAP, and the out-reaching work should start

as early as possible.

Action

16. Mr George JOR added that there were over 1000 schools in Hong

Kong and many would welcome biodiversity experts and environmental

NGOs to give lectures to their students. Dr Joanna LEE supplemented

that similar collaborations could also be established with the business

sector, which was an important stakeholder to the BSAP process and

they might be more flexible in securing resources.

17. In summary, the Convenor said the suggested form of collaboration

between environmental NGOs, the Government, and other non-

environmental organisations could possibly overcome problems like

resource limitation and limited stakeholder involvement; it could be

explored as a recommendation of the Working Group.

IV. Progress Report by the Sustainable Use, Ecological Footprint and

Ecosystem Services Focus Group

20. The leader of the Sustainable Use, Ecological Footprint and

Ecosystem Services Focus Group, Mr CHEUNG Chi-wah, gave members

an overview of the three work streams of the Focus Group, their

8

compositions, progresses and next steps.

Action

21. Dr NG Cho-nam suggested that ecosystem services should be

examined under a local context to avoid underestimation of species /

habitat values. Some species or habitats might have a higher value

than usual in a city due to cultural or other factors. He also suggested

the focus group to clarify the objective of examining the ecological

footprint of Hong Kong, whether it was to reduce the footprint, or to

enhance conservation of biodiversity, and whether assumptions and

conversion factors involved in the calculation should be treated

differently taking into account the local context. He cautioned that the

assumptions listed by the organisation developing the Footprint

calculation might not be readily applicable to Hong Kong.

22. Prof. LAM Kin-che noticed that the work on ecological footprint

would put Hong Kong under a global context and would help remind it of

its responsibility; the work on sustainable use and ecosystem services

would help people to connect to biodiversity and understand how they

would be impacted by biodiversity and vice versa. He thought that the

work on valuation of ecosystem services might help emphasise the

significance of biodiversity which in turn would help solicit public

support towards conserving biodiversity.

23. The Convenor thanked this focus group once again for looking into a

challenging topic, and invited members to provide suggestions to the

focus group.

V. Progress Report by the Focus Group on Business Sector

24. Mr Samuel KWONG reported that the Business Focus Group had

convened an inception meeting in November last year, in which

9

representatives from various chambers, including the Hong Kong General

Chamber of Commerce, the British Chamber of Commerce, the Australia

Chamber of Commerce and the Canadian Chamber of Commerce;

representatives from the Business Environment Council and individual

companies. Environmental NGOs including WWF Hong Kong and Civic

Exchange had also participated. The Focus Group had explored the

relevance between biodiversity and business and recognised that the

latter had been benefiting from biodiversity in various ways including

creation of job opportunities. To proceed, the focus group would aim

at engaging the business sector by bringing the message of biodiversity

conservation and BSAP into the sector, and to gather the existing good

works for sharing with more people. The Business Focus Group would

be organising a discussion forum 13 February to help facilitate exchange

of ideas between environmental NGOs and the business community.

Speakers invited including representatives from the financial sector

sharing how biodiversity could tie with business operation, and from

HKIEIA who will explain the EIA process to the audience. In the future,

the Focus Group would aim at encouraging other professional

organisations (e.g. HKIE) to join or organise similar workshops for their

members.

Action

25. Mr Ken SO noticed that large corporates would be willing to

consider biodiversity conservation in their business models in order to

improve their sustainability reporting, which in turn would affect

investment decisions. He pointed out that this behaviour would worth

further exploration.

26. The Convenor asked whether green groups would be invited to

share their views in the Business Discussion Forum. Mr Samuel

KWONG replied that NGOs were invited to the forum. He also said the

flyers for the forum would be prepared soon and invited members to

help distribute them to industries via their connections.

10

Action

VI. Progress of the Public Awareness and Engagement Programme

27. Mr Felix CHAN presented to members the progress of various

awareness-raising activities for BSAP. He also informed members about

the up-coming Public Forums and encouraged Focus Groups to

participate.

28. Mr Simon CHAN briefed members about the general responses

received in the first public lecture held on 18 January 2014. A total of

280 persons attended the lecture and 26 written responses were

received. A majority considered that more awareness-raising would be

needed to introduce BSAP and they should target students at school.

Many reflected that the Government should conserve the local

biodiversity by working together with different sectors of the society.

Some specifically named the species or areas requiring greater

conservation efforts, including the Chinese White Dolphins. Some said

that other social and economic concerns of the society, including

development and population policy, should also be considered under

BSAP. The Secretariat would continue to collect and compile comments

and suggestions in future public awareness activities as appropriate.

Prof. LAM Kin-che concurred with the comment on targeting the

promotion of BSAP to students, because materials designed for students

could be duplicated among the schools and the promotion would be

efficient. He added that the Committee could consider recommending

to the Government to provide resources to schools to promote

biodiversity.

29. Mr Ken SO said that it would be worthy to know the number of

attendees who were not related to BSAP Committee members or active

participants of conservation activities. He pointed out that this would

11

be the target group to reach out to, and the promotion for public

lectures should be tailored accordingly. Mr Simon CHAN replied that

about half of the audience generally belonged to this group. As this

lecture was jointly organised by ENB, EPD, AFCD and the Hong Kong

Science Museum, promotion via the Hong Kong Science Museum could

reach out to families looking for leisure activities or general science

education activities.

Action

30. Prof. LAM Kin-che was encouraged that first lecture was delivered

to a full house. Given that seats were limited, he suggested indicating

in the reply to those who could not attend that the lecture will be

recorded and posted online so that interested parties could view later.

He also asked whether the venue could absorb slight overbooking. Mr

Eric WONG replied that the first lecture was overbooked but some

registrants did not show up. There were 150 seats outside the hall with

a television showing the real-time recording of the lecture and therefore

slight overshoot of registrants could be absorbed. He added that AFCD

would roll out the promotion for the next lecture earlier to better

forecast the booking trend.

31. Dr Joanna LEE suggested that school teachers should also be

targeted to strengthen biodiversity education. Training teachers could

efficiently promote BSAP because training one would help deliver the

message to many students; given that handy teaching materials were

readily available, teachers could fit relevant information into the existing

curriculum, and it would be easier to train a teacher than to initiate a

change of curriculum to include more biodiversity topics. She

supplemented that some NGOs were already compiling relevant teaching

materials for schools, and teacher trainings could be included in the

teacher-training programme run by the Education Bureau.

12

32. Dr NG Cho-nam commented on the message to deliver when

promoting biodiversity. He suggested that the public might be able to

better comprehend the hard facts of biodiversity if they were compared

with that of the nearby regions (e.g. to compare the number of bird

species in Hong Kong verses that in Shenzhen). Such comparisons

might help highlight the value and the uniqueness of the biodiversity in

Hong Kong, and might trigger the sense of stewardship amongst the

audience. He also suggested creating slogans to emphasise the

uniqueness of Hong Kong’s biodiversity. Ms Christine LOH said that

insights from highly knowledgeable experts in Hong Kong could be put

into context and recorded in short clips for distribution. Prof. LAM

Kin-che concurred and suggested these short clips could be uploaded

onto TED.com to cater an international audience.

Action

33. Dr Michael LAU suggested combing introducing local biodiversity

with public engagement, for example, to host competitions asking

participants to identify another city of similar size as Hong Kong and with

a richer biodiversity. He also advised that feedbacks should be

collected from all public lectures or seminars to be co-organised with

NGOs or other organisations, and should be analysed to extract useful

comments for incorporation into the BSAP.

VII. Any Other Business

34. The Convenor reported that Ms Sophie LE CLUE had sent a question

to the Secretariat about the progress of mainstreaming biodiversity

within the Government. Ms Christine LOH acknowledged that

mainstreaming the message within the Government would be essential

for formulating BSAP. An early task was to introduce BSAP widely. One of

the approaches to do so was to make multiple use of the existing good

work of the Government. Stories from Government departments that

already had work that took nature conservation into account could be

13

gathered and showcased for promoting biodiversity conservation under

BSAP. This was done in the first public lecture, in which heads of the

Planning Department, Drainage Services Department and the Efficiency

Unit gathered and exchanged their views and expectations about BSAP.

She also suggested exploring whether the unions within ENB, EPD and

AFCD could be approached for collaborations to spread the BSAP

message. She also reported that there are available channels to inform

directorate level officials from relevant departments about BSAP.

Another way to spread the BSAP message in the future was via electronic

means, including mobile phone applications could also be generated

although there was cost involved. The Efficiency Unit’s youth portal or

the webpage could be a possible dissemination channel as well.

Action

35. Mr CHEUNG Chi-wah asked how the consultation and the approval

of BSAP would be done. He understood that green groups were

concerned about how the input from various organisations would be

incorporated into the BSAP. Mr CHAN Yiu-keung explained that the

engagement process of BSAP had been on-going. At the early stage,

the BSAP Committee was formed to engage stakeholders, interested

parties and experts into the discussion process. Recommendations

from the Focus Groups and Working Groups will be prioritised before

submitting to the Steering Committee, which would further discuss and

prioritise actions to be implemented. A public consultation would be

conducted towards the end of the discussion process so that the public

could provide comments on a more holistic draft of BSAP. Opinions

gathered at the consultation would be submitted to the Steering

Committee for finalising the draft. As for the actual implementation of

different actions under the BSAP, it would need further arrangement of

work and resources.

36. Ms Christine LOH supplemented how the draft of BSAP would be

14

cleared within the Government before publishing. She pointed out that

the Steering Committee, including representatives from various

Government departments therein, would look into the

recommendations submitted and prioritise them, and eventually agree

on a draft BSAP to be submitted to the Government, and the

Government would take a final view on the draft BSAP. Then the

Steering Committee would launch a public consultation. The

Government will review the draft based on the latest situation and

comments received in the consultation, and will submit the finalised

BSAP to senior officials for approval. Mr Chan Yiu-keung added that the

public consultation would be conducted at the end of 2014 or early 2015

when the Government had a view on the draft BSAP. If there were

recommendations falling outside the ambit of the departments

represented in the Steering Committee, responses could be sought via

circulation or other methods as appropriate.

Action

37. Mr TAM Po-yiu supported conducting more engagement and

consensus-building activities before proceeding to public consultation, so

that the public could be prepared and would give informed comments

during the consultation. He envisaged that while the Steering

Committee could provide a lot of support in terms of the technical

aspect of the action plans, the Government, upon receiving the

recommendations, would review them from a strategic perspective and

determine resource implications or other impacts that would be brought

up by the BSAP.

38. Mr CHEUNG Chi-wah noticed that Focus Groups might not be able

to look into all priority issues. He asked how the remaining priorities

would be dealt with. Prof. LAM Kin-che believed that a clearer picture

would appear when all Focus Groups and Working Groups submitted

their recommendations to the Steering Committee. The Steering

15

Committee could then determine an appropriate way to study the

outstanding issues. Mr Simon CHAN supplemented that other than the

Focus Groups, the Working Groups would also look into some of the

priorities and propose actions, and the Government would have relevant

recommendations to be submitted to the Steering Committee. The

Secretariat would help compile all recommendations into a draft BSAP.

He highlighted that time is very limited for compiling a draft BSAP by the

end of 2014, and therefore, Focus Groups were advised to provide their

recommendations by mid-2014.

Action

39. Mr TAM Po-yiu shared with members that one of the Focus Groups

had been discussing about adopting strategic environmental assessment

in Hong Kong which involves amending existing legislation and

revamping mechanisms. He pointed out that as the negotiation process

for changing existing mechanisms would likely be time-consuming, the

Environment Bureau would need to communicate with relevant

departments at an early stage to pave the way for future collaborations

under BSAP.

40. Mr CHAN Yiu-keung informed members that AFCD had prepared a

draft of the first part of BSAP with background information and an

overview of the existing biodiversity in Hong Kong, based on what was

known to AFCD. He pointed out that as any proposed change to the

existing mechanism would require continuous negotiation between

multiple parties, such process would take more time than compiling a

BSAP. With a view to progress the work of nature conservation in Hong

Kong, the BSAP Committee could consider recommending feasible action

plans for the draft BSAP while exploring how to deal with the

‘controversies’. He noticed that the strategies and actions in the other

BSAPs were presented in a concise manner, and suggested that the BSAP

of Hong Kong could adopt a similar style for easy comprehension by an

16

international audience.

Action

41. Ms Christine LOH concurred that the Steering Committee would

need to discuss how to deal with potentially difficult issues. For example,

while a large part of the BSAP framework would be quite technical, such

as stock-taking of biodiversity, conflict could arise over issues such as

what to include and their prioritisation. She expressed concerns about

getting bogged down by ‘controversies’ thereby preventing the Steering

Committee from proceeding with its work. She was also concerned that

the BSAP process would become a battleground for different groups to

change existing policies and laws, and that would not be conducive to

the work of the Steering Committee.

42. Dr LAU Chee-sing asked whether there were plans to consult Heung

Yee Kuk or any of the Rural Committees about BSAP. He suggested

picking an appropriate timing for the consultation, and then

presentations could be made in regular meetings of Heung Yee Kuk. Ms

Christine LOH said that Heung Yee Kuk was one of the major stakeholders

and the Government would approach it for BSAP at an earlier stage as

appropriate. Heung Yee Kuk was also welcomed to advise appropriate

occasions where the BSAP Committee could reach out to them on BSAP.

Mr CHAN Yiu-keung supplemented that there were Heung Yee Kuk

members in the BSAP Steering Committee and Working Groups, and they

were welcomed to provide comments on priority issues in meetings or

via email whenever necessary.

VIII. Date of Next Meeting

43. Prof. LAM Kin-che thanked this Working Group and encouraged

members that the implementation of the BSAP would provide better

direction to the future of biodiversity conservation in Hong Kong. The

Convenor thanked everybody for their comments and announced that

17

the next meeting would be scheduled in March or April. The exact date

of meeting would be confirmed in due course.

Action

44. There being no other business, the meeting was adjourned at 17:02

p.m.