Wong Kam-sing

The Honourable Wong Kam-sing
黃錦星
Secretary for the Environment
Incumbent
Assumed office 1 July 2012
Chief Executive	Leung Chun-ying Carrie Lam
Preceded by	Edward Yau
Personal details
Born	1963 (age 54–55)
Nationality	Chinese
Political party	None

Wong Kam-sing (Chinese: 黃錦星, born 1963) is an architect and politician in Hong Kong. He is the current Secretary for the Environment.

Career

Wong has been a council member of the Hong Kong Institute of Architects since 2005.^[1]

In 2012, Wong was appointed Secretary for the Environment. His selection was greeted with hope by environmental groups, based on his work and experience in green building. On appointment, he promised to take aggressive measures to reduce pollution,^[2] a position that was given further heft by the appointment in September of Christine Loh as his Under-Secretary for the Environment.^[3]

Policy Vision

During Mr WONG Kam-sing’s tenure as the Secretary for the Environment, he introduced a number of policy blueprints to establish the direction, targets and timeline for policies on air quality, waste management, energy, nature conservation and climate change. These blueprints include:

• March 2013, "A Clean Air Plan for Hong Kong" ^[4]；
• May 2013, "Hong Kong Blueprint for Sustainable Use of Resources 2013–2022" ^[5] ；
• February 2014, "A Food Waste & Yard Waste Plan for Hong Kong 2014–2022" ^[6]；
• May 2015, "Energy Saving Plan for Hong Kong’s Built Environment 2015–2025+" ^[7]；
• December 2015, "Hong Kong Climate Change Report 2015" ^[8]；
• December 2016, "Hong Kong Biodiversity Strategy and Action Plan 2016–2021" ^[9] ；
• January 2017, "Hong Kong’s Climate Action Plan 2030+" ^[10]

To address the challenge of air quality, Mr WONG implemented a set of new air quality objectives,^[11] soon after his assumption of office, and launched the Air Quality Health Index (AQHI)^[12] to tie in with the new air quality objectives. In 2013, a proposal was made to earmark over $10 billion to phase out old diesel commercial vehicles with a view to improving the air quality.^[13]

On waste management, five areas of strategies have been proposed, including (1) the plan to implement quantity-based waste charging through legislation based on waste reduction at source and the polluter-pays principle, in tandem with Plastic Shopping Bag Charging,^[14] as well as producer responsibility schemes (PRSs) on waste electrical and electronic equipment (WEEE),^[15] and glass beverage bottles,^[16] (2) the Food Wise Hong Kong Campaign,^[17] under which the "Big Waster" ^[18] icon has been created to encourage the public to reduce food waste at source, and the Facebook and Instagram platforms have been established to appeal to the public to “use less”, and non-governmental organisations (NGOs) have been funded by the Environment and Conservation Fund to promote surplus food donation;^[19] (3) waste separation and recovery, for which the Clean Recycling Campaign has been rolled out further to the “Blue for paper, yellow for aluminum cans and brown for plastic bottles” campaign ^[20] launched about 20 years ago; a mobile app “Waste Less” ^[21] has been developed to display over 7 000 recyclable collection points across the territory; Community Green Stations (CGSs) have been set up to progressively develop a CGS network ^[22] in all 18 districts to enhance waste reduction and recycling; and a $1 billion “Recycling Fund” ^[23] has been launched to support the recycling industry; (4) waste-to-energy, for which a number of organic resources recovery centres ^[24] are planned to be built for turning food waste into electricity or other renewable energies; and the Integrated Waste Management Facilities ^[25] under planning for decades will turn general waste into energy and generate urban renewable energy of a larger scale; and (5) hygienic landfilling, which is achieved by enhanced management of landfills and provision of subsidies for retrofitting of refuse collection vehicles for the benefit of Hong Kong.^[26] Between 2012 and 2017, legislations on the three PRSs pertaining to waste reduction including extension of Plastic Shopping Bag Charging, glass beverage bottles and WEEE (i.e. regulated electrical equipment) were passed, and a legislative framework for the Municipal Solid Waste Charging Scheme has also been proposed.^[27]

On nature conservation, the Legislative Council passed a legislation in 2013 to incorporate the country park enclaves of Tai Long Sai Wan (Sai Wan), Kam Shan and Yuen Tun into their respective country parks, increasing the area of country parks by about 38 hectares.^[28] It is stated in the 2015 Policy Address that the Government would explore the implementation of suitable and flexible measures with NGOs and consolidate the efforts of the community to better protect rural areas. In 2016, the Environment Bureau and the Agriculture, Fisheries and Conservation Department completed the first city-level Biodiversity Strategy and Action Plan for Hong Kong.^[29] In addition, after nearly 40 years of rows, the Government finally gave in-principle agreement in June 2017 to protect Sha Lo Tung, an area with a substantial portion of land under private ownership and with very high ecological value which enjoys a reputation for having marshes and streams among woodland and being a sanctuary for dragonflies, by adopting an innovative non-in-situ land exchange approach.^[30]

On energy wise green buildings, the Environment Bureau will coordinate with various bureaux and departments in reviewing the energy and green buildings policies to combat climate change.^[31] To implement the Paris Agreement, the Hong Kong Government has set a target of reducing carbon intensity from the 2005 level by 65% to 70% by 2030. It is estimated that the per capita carbon emissions will as a result reduce from 6.2 tonnes per year in recent years to 3.3 - 3.8 tonnes by 2030. Apart from launching the Energy Saving Plan for Hong Kong’s Built Environment 2015-2025+ which sets a new target of achieving energy intensity reduction by 40% by 2025 using 2005 as the base year,^[32] the Government also entered into new Scheme of Control Agreements with the two power companies in April 2017 and kick-started the formulation of the Feed-in Tariff to encourage the community to develop distributed renewable energy (RE).^[33] Moreover, $200 million has been earmarked for the provision of RE installations in government buildings and venues as well as community facilities to promote the development of RE.

Education

Mr Wong Kam-sing went to St Bonaventure College and High School and Po Leung Kuk CFA No. 1 College (Now called Po Leung Kuk No.1 W.H. Cheung College). Mr Wong graduated from the Faculty of Architecture of The University of Hong Kong in 1988. He received further education on sustainable built environment from The University of British Columbia in Canada in the 1990s.^[34]

Family

Mr Wong’s wife is Ms Susan Leung So-wan who is also an architect. Ms Leung was past Chair of The Board of Local Affairs of The Hong Kong Institute of Architects.^[35][36] They have a daughter.

References