Appoint a professional to head Hong Kong environment department rather than a bureaucrat, say advisers

The new head of the Environmental Protection Department should be someone with professional expertise rather just than another administrative officer, green groups and government advisers say.

Such a move would help prevent the director of environmental protection from making decisions based on politics, rather than science and fact, they argue.

The EPD and the then Environment, Transport and Works Bureau’s Environment Branch were merged to form the current structure in 2005 to “achieve synergy between policy formulation and implementation” and reduce staff costs. The Environment Bureau was formed two years later.

Before the split, the EPD functioned mainly as an executive department headed by a specialist and tasked with enforcing environmental laws and implementing policies. The environmentalists are calling for the role of the EPD and Environment Bureau to be delineated more clearly when incumbent director Anissa Wong Sean-yee retires.

“An administrative officer’s thoughts are on political compromise … Scientific evidence often takes more of a back seat,” said Friends of the Earth senior environmental affairs officer Melonie Chau Yuet-cheung.