After their return, each group was required to complete a report within a week. A jury made up of university experts, curriculum development officers from the Education Department and representatives from the foundation was set up to pick the winner.

A group of seven secondary students from different schools who went on a trip to the city of Qingdao and got a glimpse of the city's application of modern technologies to environmen tal protection won the championship.

Ronald Cheng Chung-tai, a Form Seven science student at the Tsoi Kung Po Secondary School, who was the team leader of the group said he was deeply impressed with the environmentally-friendly measures of the local government of Qingdao. 'Most people tend to think mainland cities are heavily polluted, but this is not true about Qingdao.'

Teammate Fam Yuk-chi, a sixth form arts student from Kowloon True Light Middle School, shared his views. 'We visited the Qingdao Marine University, which is the chief think- tank for the local government on the subject.

'We also did a lot of interviews and surveys. All events and findings were given detailed coverage and in-depth analysis in our report. I guess this gave us an edge over others,' she said.