Opening the sewage treatment works on Stonecutters Island should have marked the beginning of the end of Hong Kong's septic seas. Instead, we face the gloomy prospect of the phase not being complete until the millennium, and only operating at 25 per cent capacity. Even when fully operational the system is not the advanced form of sewage treatment which a highly developed and overpopulated territory requires.
It is admittedly of compact design, with large capacity, but environmentalists favour a radical approach. They prefer a system based on water conservation and recycling, where households have separate supplies for domestic and sanitary needs. This would involve a high capital outlay, but would cut long-term maintenance costs.
Although urgently needed, the scheme has hit one hurdle after another from the start. Apart from disputes about imported labour, contractual wrangles, and a political row with China, which quite rightly objected to the sewage residue from Phase Two being dumped in its seas, we now have the disquieting prospect of Chief Executive-designate Tung Chee-hwa implying that the second stage might be delayed in favour of industrial development.
There is a widespread illusion that environmental issues are not a priority. But the natural world is being overwhelmed by the toxins that are forever pouring into the ecosystem, and it has to stop. Without a healthy environment, there is no prosperity. Until the sea recovers, the fishing industry will decline. Unless the air is purified, health costs will escalate. For evidence, look at the figures for respiratory disease in Hong Kong, or at the alarming escalation in childhood asthma. When the infirm are warned to stay indoors because of declining air quality, and beaches are off-limit because of toxic seas, the message should be clear.
Critics rightly call this a society with a First World lifestyle in a Third World environment. We can easily afford to restore a proper balance between the needs of the economy and the demands of the natural world.
Nor can we forget the $84 billion contribution tourism makes to the economy. It is our biggest foreign exchange earner, but we will not go on attracting visitors if our seafood is unfit to eat, our sea hazardous to bathers and our drinking water has to be saturated with chemicals before it is safe.
