Hong Kong to Create 25 Man-made Islands?

Early this month, AFP reported that Hong Kong government had proposed to create 25 man-made islands off the city's coast.

Image source: Google Map

It said that in a desperate attempt to ease land shortage, officials proposed the creation of a 1500-hectare man-made giant island and 24 other smaller islands on Wednesday.

If constructed, the artificial island would have an area larger than the island reclaimed for Hong Kong's international airport and would require claiming land from sea up to 14.5 metres deep, the government said.

Of course, environmentalists in Hong Kong and particularly WWF was right in voicing its concern as this would inevitably affect the city's natural shorelines.

We are blessed with bigger and less densely populated country compared to Hong Kong. Malaysians own bigger land area to build houses and plant crops. People in the more developed city of Hong Kong don't have this kind of luxury. Property prices in Hong Kong soared last year due to shortage of land and leader Donald Tsang vowed to boost the city's land supply in ways he sees fit.

While WWF Hong Kong is closely monitoring such proposal and development, we Malaysians are taking the more laid-back approach when it comes to public response to people's poor treatment to the soil.


We have beautiful hills for paragliding whatever activities and it is our responsibility to preserve the floral beauty of our land...

Newly found paragliding spot in Tamparuli, Sabah

Instead, we cut them indiscriminately first and foremost for personal gain...

Hill cutting is rampant, particularly in Penampang Sabah

And we cut trees at pleasure...

Why would they chop off non-obstructing trees in Tg. Aru?

Perhaps we will start thinking and listening when every city in our country is submerged by flash floods. By then, we may be able to realise that we have only ourselves to blame for such disaster.

Hong Kong citizens are always on alert and I believe the government will pull through the situation where they need to strike a balance between nature conservation and development.

What about us? The least we can do is to report activities that we feel are damaging the environment. I don't travel a lot and I can only see what's happening in and around my place. You can do your bit for your respective areas; take a shots or two and highlight your concerns through media of your choice.