Greener Pastures?

There’s a growing international consensus lately that green initiatives, far from being a waste of money in tough times, could be the way out of the current global economic plight. In the US, President Obama’s chief of staff Rahm Emanuel has emphasized that we should “never allow a crisis to go to waste.” “They are opportunities to do good things,” he went on to say, and argued that moving the economy in a greener, low-carbon direction would tackle the urgent problems facing our financial as well natural climates today. US$50 billion has since been allocated to green initiatives as part of the US stimulus bill, while new clean technology training programs are rapidly springing up across the country both at universities and companies such as General Electric.

Sadly, our own government’s initiatives pale in comparison. Green economics is the fastest growing field of economics today, and would appear most relevant to Hong Kong—where air pollution has risen to dangerous levels, and where many are losing faith in the long-term reliability of our traditional engines of economic growth such as finance and logistics. Yet the city’s policy-makers have been slow to embrace the trend. According to a poll conducted by the Civic Party last month, 80 percent of Hongkongers believe a greener economy to be the way forward for Hong Kong, and over half feel the government’s efforts in this direction have been inadequate. Much criticism has been directed at Financial Secretary John Tsang’s budget speech in February, which welcomed the term “green economy” with open arms but was thin on concrete proposals.

One of two main promises it did make was to promote the use of electric cars in Hong Kong. Secretary for the Environment Edward Yau cited the measure as one of the most important for transforming local industry in a sustainable direction. But many local environmentalists aren’t holding their breath. Edwin Lau, Chairman of Friends of the Earth, says there’s little point trying to introduce the car before an electric grid for charging its batteries has been set up. Perhaps more importantly, he also adds such cars will ultimately still be running off two major sources of pollution at the moment in Hong Kong: the local power stations. “So long as we’re not using more alternative sources of energy,” Lau says, “electric cars will still mean emissions—they simply come from chimneys rather than tailpipes.”

The second big promise was to promote green buildings (see “Green is Good”). Critics believe this is more of a step in the right direction, but not nearly enough of one. Civic Party vice chairman Albert Lai says the money allocated to the cause is “far short of what’s needed,” while Legco member Patrick Lau says bureaucratic red tape will make it hard to put these plans into action for too long.

The overwhelming response among environmentally concerned observers to the government’s announcements overall is that they barely begin to address the full scope of Hong Kong’s environmental problems. And this means they fail to capitalize on all the potential areas for green jobs in Hong Kong. While investing in local possibilities for alternative energy would be one natural place to start, Civic Exchange chief executive Christine Loh emphasizes that “green jobs” don’t have to be in the green tech sector. She points out that in a green economy the ecological footprint of companies will need to be measured, which will open the way for many new positions. “Measuring things other than financial data will become big and they will need recruits who know how to do this sort of thing,” she says. She also adds that IT jobs are likely to come into play, citing the example of Cisco Systems collaborating with other cities to help manage traffic, and the potential role of Personal Digital Assistants in the future when it comes to advising individuals about how to best manage their carbon emissions.

Plenty of other jobs stand to be created in a green economy. On March 19, the Civic Party released its Action Agenda for a Green New Deal, estimating that if the government invested $35.8 billion in a number of different green projects, it could create 87,000 new jobs in return. One of the plan’s main calls is for public works money to be invested in “sustainable infrastructure” projects instead of the usual roads and bridges to nowhere. These include vital sewage, waste and water treatment plants, which together could create around 22,600 jobs. Clean transport initiatives are another fruitful area. These include “public bikes for all schemes” such as the one famously adopted first in France and now becoming popular in the US and Europe, a possible electric road-pricing scheme, and the expansion and improvement of pedestrian areas. Lai says the continuous promenades along the harbor that many Hong Kongers have been hoping for would be a particularly labor-intensive project.