Annex
Options Considered Impracticable

Land Resumption

Application

		By means of land resumption, the Government exercises statutory power to compulsorily take over ownership of private land for achieving a public purpose.  The Government has resorted to land resumption on many occasions in the past for purposes other than nature conservation.  For instance, private land has been resumed for developing new towns and building major infrastructure.  Ex-gratia compensation calculated according to the established formula has been paid to the affected landowners and occupants.  However, according to legal advice, whether nature conservation can be justified as a public purpose for triggering land resumption needs to be determined on a case-by-case basis.  

2.		Adopting land resumption as a conservation tool demands a majority consensus in the community, as considerable manpower and financial resources are required in completing the resumption procedures and providing compensation to the eligible parties.  The financial implication for the Government is also an important issue that needs to be taken into account.    

Merits

3.		Land resumption will allow the Government to gain complete control of a site and manage it for nature conservation purpose.  The site may also be made available for a number of uses that can generate benefits for the public provided that they will not adversely affect the ecological value of the area, e.g. promotion of conservation education, nature appreciation, other forms of passive recreation, eco-tourism, etc.

Feasibility

4.		The financial implications of this option are tremendous.  We have conducted a rough assessment on the potential resumption and clearance costs involved in the acquisition of about 10 ecologically important sites of private land that are identified based on the available ecological information.  The costs estimated according to the existing compensation rates are in the order of $20 billion for a total area of about 1,000 hectares of private land involved.  That has not included the recurrent costs for managing the resumed sites.  Notwithstanding the potential benefits in relation to nature conservation to be gained from the resumption of a site, the huge financial implications arising are definitely a concern and affect its practicability.  Since with the existing measures many important habitats in Hong Kong including some on private land have already been conserved, there are reservations over the cost effectiveness of spending huge resources on enhancing conservation of a few additional sites under private ownership.  

5.			This option is considered neither feasible nor sustainable.

Land Exchange

Application

		This option will involve the Government granting developable government land to a landowner in exchange for his surrender of his agricultural lot of high ecological importance.  It is a non-insitu land exchange that is not supported by existing land policy, since it involves a direct grant of government land by way of private treaty and is against our long established principle of open competition on land resources.

Merits

2.		Similar to land resumption, this option will allow the Government to gain complete control of a site and protect it against incompatible activities and uses.  The conserved site can also be made available for public uses that are compatible with the conservation objective.  

Feasibility

3.		Based on past experience, any land exchange is expected to take years to complete, as negotiations with the landowners over the terms of exchange are likely to be protracted.  Acquisition of the private land concerned also cannot be guaranteed.  Besides, the Government's position in the negotiations may be severely undermined by the proclaimed desire to acquire the land.  Multiple landownership particularly in respect of land in the New Territories will also give rise to complicated problems.  Most importantly, there will not be enough government land in the land reserve for implementing this option.  

4.		This option is considered not practicable.

Tightening of the Existing Conservation Measures

Application

		Under this option, protection of habitats under conservation zonings on town plans will be strengthened by tightening the uses permitted within those zonings.  

2.		Under the TPO, zonings are designated for regulating land uses at specific sites to meet pre-defined planning objectives such as residential development, commercial use, nature conservation, etc.  As explained in Chapter 2, SSSI, CA and CPA are commonly regarded as conservation zonings since they all share the common objective of protecting the natural features of an area concerned.  The notes to a town plan would specify for each zoning a list of uses that are always permitted and a list of uses that would require approval by the Town Planning Board (TPB) before they are allowed to proceed.  For protection purpose, the number of uses that are permitted within conservation zonings is fairly limited. 

3.		The Planning Department has recently completed a review and considers that, inter alia, there are rooms for further tightening of the permitted uses for enhancing conservation of important habitats.  For example, TPB has recently agreed to tighten the control over SSSI by restricting the scope of the “always permitted uses” to cover mainly country park and wild animals protection area.

Merits

4.		This option will enhance the conservation function of the conservation zonings.  Implementation will be relatively simple since there are established procedures for making changes to statutory town plans under the TPO.  

Feasibility

5.		The land use zoning system is primarily a planning tool for controlling land uses, and human activities are beyond its ambit.  It therefore cannot protect a site from incompatible activities provided that they do not constitute any changes to the land uses allowable under the respective zonings.  It does not provide any incentives to the landowners to carry out activities that will better conserve the site either.  On the other hand, policing and enforcement against illegal land uses require tremendous resources.  In addition, it is impossible to prohibit land uses that may not conform with the conservation zonings if they were already in existence before the land use zoning was imposed.  

6.		This option cannot tackle the main problems relating to conservation of private land of high ecological importance and hence its effectiveness is very limited.  

Off-site Mitigation

Application

		Under this option, proponents of designated projects under the EIA Ordinance will be allowed to compensate for the adverse ecological impacts arising from their projects by putting money into a Fund instead of implementing on-site mitigation measures.

2.		The EIA Ordinance requires proponents of designated projects to avoid causing adverse environmental impact as far as practicable, and if total avoidance is not  practicable, to mitigate the adverse impact to an acceptable level.  As stipulated under the Technical Memorandum to the EIA Ordinance, mitigation measures should be conducted on-site.  Off-site mitigation may only be considered after the potential for implementing on-site mitigation has been exhausted.  However, in some cases on-site mitigation measures implemented for individual projects are small in scale and piece-meal in nature.  In these cases, it may better serve the nature conservation purpose if project proponents are allowed the alternative of putting monetary compensation into a Fund.  The Fund can then be used for resuming selected sites of high ecological importance for active conservation management to compensate for the ecological functions lost.

Merits

3.		This option can enable the Government to acquire ecologically important sites under private ownership without drawing on public money and will also provide proponents of designated projects under EIA Ordinance with more flexibility in drawing up mitigation measures.  It could be used for projects where substantive on-site mitigation is not practicable because of, for example, site constraints, and for cases where it is considered that the money to be spent on on-site mitigation could be better used to protect other sites of higher ecological importance.

Feasibility

4.		Amendment of the EIA Ordinance and its Technical Memorandum to change the existing requirements regarding mitigation of possible ecological impacts will be required for implementing this option.  For example, provisions need to be made for payment of money by developers into the Fund instead of conducting on-site mitigation, allowing the adoption of off-site mitigation not on a “like for like” and “last resort” basis, relaxing the current “no-net-loss” principle in calculating ecological compensation, and so on.  The need to revise these well-established mitigation / compensation principles under the existing EIA mechanism would have huge implications, and the overall merits from the nature conservation perspective are uncertain.

5.		Besides, it could be very difficult, if not impossible, to draw up clear and widely acceptable criteria for deciding on the designated projects to which this option could be applied and the amount of money developers are to pay into the Fund in lieu of on-site mitigation.  The decisions are likely to be politically controversial, and lengthy debates or negotiations are expected.  The gap between the time when the ecological impacts surface and the time when the off-site mitigation to compensate for the ecological functions lost will be implemented is also a concern.

6.		The practical difficulties and uncertainties associated with this option are immense.

Transfer of Development Rights

Application

		Under this option, the Government will grant development rights to a landowner on another piece of land in exchange for surrendering his development rights at the site to be protected for nature conservation purpose.  This option is considered not applicable in Hong Kong, since the private land where important habitats are found are usually held under agricultural leases under which the landowners are not entitled to any development rights for transfer.