Tackle landfill issue head on

Chief Executive Leung Chun-ying said on Sunday that many communities do not want landfills in their vicinities but society as a whole and the government need to tackle the difficulties head on, because avoiding challenges is irresponsible behavior. Staying true to the spirit of taking responsibility for Hong Kong society's overall interest and future development, Leung is working very hard to prevent the waste disposal problem by expanding the city's existing landfills and deserves the understanding and support of people from all walks of life.

The government's funding request for preliminary studies of landfill expansion in Tuen Mun failed to win Legislative Council (LegCo) approval last week. It was mainly an aftereffect of the Tseung Kwan O (TKO) landfill extension plan funding request debacle. Government departments concerned should learn a lesson from the setback and pursue funding for all three landfill expansion projects at the same time with particular attention to addressing specific concerns of local communities and ways to compensate their losses to win their support.

The three existing landfills will exceed their capacities in two, four and six years' time respectively with TKO landfill, which is closest to urban areas among the three, expected to fill up first. It is a strategic necessity to expand the landfills at the same time so that they can share the burden together. Abandoning any one would inevitably make it harder to expand the other two. With funding requests for the three expansion plans blocked by LegCo, the government needs to learn a lesson from and never seek to proceed with them separately again.

This is an excerpted translation of a Wen Wei Po editorial published on July 15.

(HK Edition 07/16/2013 page1)