People now living in government-owned and managed low rental housing, or who are qualified and on the waiting list have preference in the allocation of low-cost housing under the Home Ownership Scheme. Although the Home Ownership Scheme ceased building new flats in 2004 in a bid to arrest the falling real estate market, there are still several thousand inventory units unsold. It is thought that by re-launching the scheme, most young people who now find private property out of reach will be able to build their new home in a place they can call their own.

As I have pointed time and again, our housing problem is a highly complicated issue requiring a systemic solution. Anything in the system is intertwined with everything else and there is simply no easy way out. Off-the-top solutions like resuming the Home Ownership Scheme can only lead to other bigger problems. It seems that only some government officials are aware of the pitfalls of simply re-launching the Home Ownership Scheme. Our politicians and pundits either never study the issue and its relevant statistics, or they never bother to do any research before uttering their comments and suggestions.

As I understand it, applying for government low rental housing is very popular among undergraduate students, because they are all low income adults with practically no assets and quite a sum of debt. Therefore they are invariably qualified. Statistics indicate that there are an increasing number of university graduates living in these estates. This clever move is their legal entitlement, and it solves their housing problems. On top of that, this is their ticket to the Home Ownership Scheme once it is resumed.

I am citing only university students and graduates as examples. The much larger number of young people who never manage to get a higher education are even more highly qualified. Now you can imagine the big headache our government would face once the Home Ownership Scheme was reactivated. Because of the long period of neglect, the housing problem is now too big to be tackled in a piecemeal fashion.

But, as laymen, few of us realize that we are living in a city that is also geologically gifted. A 49-square-kilometer area in Hong Kong is now being designated China’s 183rd national geopark. The site, which hosts one of the world’s biggest collections of hexagonal rock columns formed by volcanic activity 140 million years ago, is expected soon to be elevated from its national status to UNESCO World Heritage status, which will once more put Hong Kong on the map.

Geoparks everywhere are for people to enjoy, as part of the now fashionable eco-tourism. Chief Executive Donald Tsang vowed during the officiating ceremony to redouble efforts to preserve and promote our geopark to the rest of the world. Ten trails have been developed in the geopark to facilitate visitors. In addition to the Maclehose Trail, Wilson Trail, and Hong Kong Trail, we now have an additional Geopark Trail. Good news for hikers.

However, the natural environment and tourism usually do not mix. A large number of tourists will invariably harm the environment. That is why public access to the Mai Po wetland is strictly restricted. While we cannot apply the same to our hiking trails, we do not want to see them become another Mong Kok on holidays either. Take a look at the amount of garbage collected every Saturday and Sunday in our country parks and the number of hill fires every year, and you will understand my misgivings.

Preservation and promotion is therefore a contradiction. As a natural heritage, by definition it has to be preserved for posterity. If we do not pay enough attention to preserving it, like some World Heritage sites on the mainland and elsewhere in the world, the global designation would be likely to be withdrawn. Like natural wonders everywhere, the geopark is for everybody. Visitors are most welcome, but we do not have to make an additional effort to promote it to attract outsiders and their money.

Commercialism is out-of-bounds here, as heritage is something money cannot buy. Tourism Development Board, please take your hands off this natural treasure.

The compensation package is too complicated to set out here. In sum, however, it was a whopping HK$2 billion for 25 hectares of agricultural land in a remote area of the city. This was unprecedented and government officials assured us this is a special case that will not re-occur in the future.

While we fully understand the sentimental value of homeland to the 160 households living there for decades, and the hardship involved in their relocation, together with the pressure for a quick settlement on the part of the government to avoid further delay in the much overdue construction, the rules are there and there is a limit to how much they should be bent. Most people across the political spectrum agree that this time our government is bending too much, and it will inevitably set a bad precedent for the future.

Many of the much publicized Ten Major Infrastructure Projects are still in their preliminary stage, and land reacquisition will soon take place in many different parts of Hong Kong. It is unimaginable that the current compensation package will not be used as a reference. In particular, people will make all kinds of excuses to build another “special” case for special treatment, and in the course of doing so, some politicians will be more than happy to lend their helping hands to win votes and influence public decision.

Over-compensating the landlords and tenant villagers in Tsoi Yuen Village will make future negotiations much tougher and of longer duration, and the government will always end up paying more to those who shout the loudest, and who have politicians as their allies. This in turn will spill over into other areas and invite more protests, which will further enhance our culture of crying babies, protesting for anything and everything.

This will become a vicious cycle.

The case for this project is simple: the mainland is building a national network of high-speed railways which will greatly enhance connectivity among major cities in the country, and Hong Kong just cannot afford to be left out of the game. Otherwise the result is certain marginalization. On the other hand, once plugged in, the rail links contribution to future development of the city will be huge. Hong Kong will be more in tune with the country’s rapid growth.

The case against it is somewhat more complicated. There are the usual dissident politicians who will object to anything and want everything. On this issue, they are against the site chosen for the repair yard, and support villagers’ demands for higher compensation, but at the same breath, they seem to want to scrap the entire project. They don’t know what they are talking about, but we all know what they mean.

There is a much larger group of young people who on the face of it look and sound like the dissident politicians. We don’t know what they are talking about, but if listened to carefully, an undertone of class-struggle can clearly be detected. What they really mean is, “I am not happy, because every benefit is likely go to the big real estate developers. I don’t care if Hong Kong will become marginalized to the point of being an agricultural economy, because there is nothing in it for me in the present setting of ‘collusion between government and business’.”

The frustration among the younger generation is real and cannot be ignored. Our government withheld land sales for years pushing real estate prices to world records, while today even the middle-class is deprived the opportunity of buying their own flats and are forced to pay exorbitant rents for living quarters which can only be described as tiny by any standard. The Gini’s Coefficient which measures the income disparity in a society has long been in the danger zone and is getting worse. If I were someone in Yau Ma Tei looking for a job while reading the much publicized story of the HK$500 million duplex, I would say, let’s go to hell.

So far, I have to admit that the West Kowloon Station looks and smells like a re-run of the old real estate scam. It is now up to the government to prove otherwise to gain popular support for the whole project.

The portability of welfare has long been taboo in our public policy. There are thousands of descendants of Hong Kong citizens living in Shenzhen crossing the border everyday to study here, and not much has been done to help them. The rationale is we cannot spend public money outside the city even if it is for the benefit of Hong Kong citizens.

In the present policy address, our government takes the initiative to allow three Shenzhen schools to open special Hong Kong curriculum classes catering specifically to Hong Kong children. Taken together with the recent announcement of a joint venture hospital in Shenzhen for Hong Kong citizens, it seems that there is a paradigm shift in our government on the issue of portability of welfare of Hong Kong citizens residing on the mainland.

Previously officials argued that since there are a great number of Hong Kong citizens living outside Hong Kong as a result of massive immigration before the handover, once the government extends welfare to look after those living on the mainland it will have to do the same to those living in Canada, Australia, the UK, etc. The subsequent financial burden is big, and worse still, nobody can estimate how big it is.

The point is, our people living on the mainland are strictly speaking not immigrants. They are just living in other parts of the country. However, under “One Country, Two Systems”, they are not entitled to the welfare benefits of residents there. When they are in need of a certain service, such as education and medical treatment, they will invariably come back to Hong Kong. And when they do so, the costs on both the public and the individuals concerned are much higher than if they enjoy the same service on the mainland. It is therefore a win-win solution to make certain welfare facilities and payments available inside the mainland to Hong Kong citizens living there.

I am glad that Chief Executive Donald Tsang has finally made some experimental moves in the right direction. Next item on the agenda: homes for the senior citizens?

Like Hong Kong in the 1960s, with rapid industrialization and growing population and probably together with climatic factors, Guangdong has suffered from perennial droughts in recent years, especially in the north-eastern part of the province. This year the situation seems to be quite severe and the Guangdong government issued a drought warning last month.

Now that there is a contract between Hong Kong and Guangdong which guarantees our supply of water, we have so much water that every year our reservoirs have to spill over millions of cubic meters of water into the sea. The current water supply situation in the region is expected to get worse, Hong Kong will soon be seen as wasteful and irresponsible.

This is surely not good for our image, and when the water supply contract comes up for renewal in the not too distant future, chances are that we might not get as much water as we desire. This is understandable because ultimately the Guangdong government will have to be accountable to its citizens for adequate water supply.

Our day of reckoning will come soon, and we will have to be prepared for it. I have lived through the horrible experience of water rationing, and I am sure we do not want it to happen again.

In the short run, we have to plug our pipes against leakage because according to official admittance as much as 20 percent of our water supply has been wasted this way. Some of our treated water can be used for street cleaning, etc., instead of being pumped into the sea. Our government has to launch a campaign to advocate more thrifty habits in the use of water.

Moreover, we will have to plan for a higher degree of water self-sufficiency. We should learn from Singapore which is desalinating sea water through reverse-osmosis. In fact our entrepreneurs have mastered the state-of-the-art technology in making semi-permeable membranes for the process.

Every time I go to Beijing, I try to squeeze in some time to walk the alleys and ride public transport. Through these up-close and personal experiences, I can get a feel for the mood of the city.

This time I did the same, and I liked what I saw.

Wherever I went I heard people talking about traffic control, shops closing early, people leaving town, etc. People in Beijing were making great sacrifices with significant disruptions in their daily lives to make way for the big celebration. Never once could I detect a trace of resentment in the conversations I overheard. My Beijing friends told me that as inhabitants of the capital, they are used to similar disruptions, and they are now taking them as facts of life here. Still, this is the commendable spirit of harmony and the whole country owes them forbearance.

The subway was crowded as usual as it remains heavily subsidized. One can ride it anywhere, and the fee is just 2 yuan across the board. On each trip, some youth invariably stood up to offer his seat to me, sometimes two simultaneously. Though with grey hair all over, I never quite accept I am old, and I did not mind standing. However, these are offers I did not want to refuse either. So I sat down, with great warmth in my heart, knowing our younger generation has reacquired the habit of respecting senior citizens, as this was long the tradition of our great culture.

These encounters deeply touched me because they were great contrasts with our experience here in Hong Kong. We have recently got into the habit of incessantly complaining about almost everything, but at the same time, no one is doing anything positive. I travel almost daily on our public transport system, but seldom do I get a seat offered to me. Very often, if I want to sit, I have to fight with people a third my age. Yet we think we are civilized and mainlanders are country pumpkins.

Such prejudice is embedded in our common psyche and reinforced daily through our media. If you read our local newspapers, you might have the impression that the mainland is on the verge of breaking apart. The fact is, if these people are at all serious to find out, that the average mainland people are happy and content and are at the moment enjoying their yearly Golden Week holidays.

During the past six decades, the ruling Communist Party of China has performed the miraculous feat of saving the country from a century of free fall, rebuilding it from the ruins of 12 years of war and to initiate a growth cycle in which China is soon to become the No 2 economy in the world. As it stumbled along, it encountered a few setbacks in the first three decades, which nevertheless laid the foundation for the second three decades of unprecedented, frenetic growth. Materially and technologically, it is not an exaggeration to say that China has achieved in three decades what has taken the West three centuries. This, however, has been accomplished at some social and environmental costs, which the country is now trying hard to redress.

From the point of view of Chinese citizens, the past sixty years have given us back our dignity and self-confidence, and earned us a place in the 21st century. This is most important for the Chinese people, because for most part throughout known history, China has always been No 1 in the world. Its defeat in the Opium War in 1842 and the subsequent century-long humiliation and hardship had led many to question our survivability on this planet. We have now proved to the world in an irrefutable manner that we Chinese are as good as anybody. We the people feel good about it.

And come to think of it, the Chinese people have never felt so good since the Song Dynasty a thousand years ago. Looking back, this single factor is overriding, and the rest, for better or for worse, are only secondary. For this, the ruling Communist Party of China has earned its place in our national history.

To restore the glory of Han and Tang, we will have to overcome the constraints of our population, resources and the environment, and the social and political challenges both internal and international that lie ahead. Are we as wise as our ancestors? We Chinese will always let the future be the judge.

Even by a very long stretch of imagination, it would be very difficult to establish the case that Tsang could affect the internal transfer of a YWCA social worker, through political interference. This is simply too far-fetched and entirely impossible.

But that is what is being said of Tsang.

The social worker concerned did not like the transfer which YWCA insisted was regular and had nothing to do with any interference by Tsang. The social worker resigned from the YWCA and now is waging a battle against Tsang in company with some opposition lawmakers. Tsang was summoned to a hearing of the Legislative Council, but the Council could not establish any improper conduct by Tsang.

It has been shown that what Tsang did was to make a casual remark to the head of the YWCA that he had been sent a copy of a complaint letter concerning the social worker. He said he observed somewhat in passing that harmony in Tai O seemed to be disturbed. There was no indication that he elevated concern or displeasure, and the District Officer in charge of Outlying Islands who was also being accused of political interference flatly denied making remarks attributed to him. He had played no role in the incident.

This is yet another case of much ado about nothing except character assassination by the opposition camp. Apart from groundless suspicions, there is not even prima facia evidence that political meddling has taken place. No matter, the opposition legislators strongly demanded the government launch a thorough investigation into the affair and make public its findings all the same. Should our government succumb to such a ludicrous demand, then in the future anybody who gets sacked or transferred to an unwelcome post can also claim political persecution and ask for “a thorough official investigation into the affair and make public its findings”.More than wasting public money on a wild goose chase, the atmosphere so generated of political correctness and yielding to all opposition’s demands no matter how outlandish they are is suffocating governance, seriously hindering all government efforts to get things done. It also encourages political blackmailing for self interest. Take it from me, if we let it go on there will be many more protests, and they will never cease.

Now a group of about 50 tenant farmers in Tsoi Yuen Tsuen in a northern part of the New Territories are resisting efforts to move them to a nearby area to make way for the cross-border express link.

The farmers claimed they did not want compensation, and they just want to stay put and carry on with their lives. Some sympathetic NGOs teamed up with them to protest. The villagers submitted a plan to the government, urging it to move an emergency rescue station and a depot planned for the village site to a nearby open-storage area, which officials claimed would affect even more people.

Now a deadlock has ensued. These villagers do not have a case, and should they have their way, they would set a precedent which could lead to sweeping changes in land policy. Moreover, this is also another very dangerous precedent proving that no matter how untenable your position may be, if you could shout loudly enough, the government will bend over backwards to please you. It was similar bad precedents in the past that prompted an incident like this to take place today. Should this be allowed to go on, Hong Kong simply will become ungovernable.

But judging from the reaction of our government to recent events such as school-based drug tests, these farmers will most likely get their way. More than that, now some of the NGOs attracted by the villagers want to stop building the complete railway altogether. They cited whatever reasons you can imagine just to stop it. The real reason: they do not want Hong Kong to link up so closely and so quickly with the mainland.

Because Hong Kong has been procrastinating, we are now a full two years behind Shenzhen in linking up with the high speed national railway system. Our retarded connectivity with the fast growing hinterland is going to carry a price. Delaying the project any longer raises the risk of marginalisation and the decline of Hong Kong’s position in the country. Stopping the express link is bound to be disastrous. Our government should show us the will to govern and some guts in saying no to outrageous demands, for the public interest.

China has mastered the art of boosting the manufacturing sector, and has demonstrated globally that it is extremely successful. As for the development of service industries, we are still at a loss as to what to do — we have had a tendency to clone the manufacturing model. Governments at all levels will build numerous cultural industrial parks, the great majority of which we all know will ultimately turn into real estate projects. Along the way, some people will make a lot of money. As for cultural industries, future statistics will show some increase especially in exports, which will most probably increase regardless whether there are government incentives or not. This is obviously not a very efficient way to promote culture.Culture in its broadest sense is the way we conduct our daily lives. On the face of it, I do not see much distinct cultural difference in the daily life of ordinary city residents compared with their Western counterparts. Apart from the Chinese characters on the signage, our cities look almost exactly like any other city in the world. All the landmark buildings in Beijing were designed by foreign architects, and they were never meant to look Chinese anyway. We have long lost our ethnic costumes and we dress just like everybody else. There is no uniqueness in our transportation modes now that there are probably more bicycles on the road in many other European and Japanese cities. Yes, our food is unique, and we all use chopsticks instead of forks and knives. Foreigners around the world are crazy about Chinese food, and there are Chinese restaurants everywhere you go. That is about it.

Come to think of it, we have lost most of the unique aspects of our culture, especially in cities that stride toward modernization. We have adopted everything that is Western. At the moment there are probably more Chinese elements preserved in Korean and Japanese culture. At the present stage, the most important thing to me is to regain our cultural identity, to strengthen and to enrich it, and not to make a quick killing on the pauperism of what little we have left after a hundred years of destruction and self-destruction. In short, if we place less emphasis on how to converge with the so-called international practices, and think more about how to live better and happier in our own way, we will regain our cultural identity and sooner or later it will shine.

As for cultural exports, if all we mean is cartoons and animation, before the ’90s, China used to be a major center in outsourcing until we were overtaken by the Koreans. If you call doing the donkey work for multinationals, rendering a Mickey Mouse cultural export, it is a little far-fetched. Watch our homemade cartoons on TV, and you will appreciate why our kids love to watch Japanese ones, and why our panda has recently become a Hollywood cartoon hero. We still have a long way to go, and it will take a consistent government policy to create an industry in the long run. In that case, our eyes should be on the home market instead of earning foreign exchange.

Because we are so bent on exporting and pleasing the Western audience, our recent movies are on the whole cultural disasters and yet they have won numerous international awards. Even our famous 798 Arts District that was the designated tourist spot during the Olympic Games last year is filled with caricatures of Chinese images designed to tickle foreigners. If we venture along this path, very soon we will end up as international prostitutes of culture: Give me money, and I will do anything to please you. Without dignity and a soul in our cultural products and services, we will end up nowhere, not to mention armed with soft power.

I don’t like the word “soft power” because from the very start it carries a hegemonic connotation. Our leaders declare time and again that China never harbors any hegemonic intention, and we had better stay away from that dirty word. But if we mean goodwill, when you travel in Africa, the Middle East and Latin America, I can assure you that you can easily discover that China in fact enjoys much greater goodwill than both the United States and the European Union despite their touted soft power.

The problem is that many of our pundits still hang on to a psychological complex, and that until they get a pat on their back by the ex-colonial powers, they will never feel like they are being recognized. In that case, China will be forever condemned to be Western followers, living by the rules and standards they set, and can never be their equals. If our aspiration is to be a re-emergent power, we will have to set our own rules. Once China attains that status, we don’t have to worry about cultural exports, as others will knock on our doors. Take Putonghua, for example. Before, few foreigners wanted to learn this difficult and alien language; now we don’t have to push it, Putonghua is already the second language taught in many schools overseas. The bottleneck is that there is a deficiency of trained teachers.

Coming back to cultural industries, because we have a huge population getting richer by the day, we can afford to focus on satisfying the domestic market first to develop our own unique style. If we set the right objectives and the accompanying legislations and policy measures, we don’t have to worry about the market, and certainly don’t have to bend over backwards to please overseas markets.

Western individualism has never flourished on the Chinese mainland, and for that matter in Hong Kong. Chinese believe in moderation and the middle way, and as corollary, a good balance between individual rights and public interest.

The proposed review of the Personal Data (Privacy) Ordinance therefore seems a bit biased in favor of personal privacy.

Though our officials have stressed that this has nothing to do with the controversial school-based drug-testing trial, it is a case that nobody can escape reference. Minors are supposed to be under the guardianship of their parents who make decisions in their best interest. In spite of overwhelming support of the program from parents, minors are given discretion as to whether to join the trial; hence the effectiveness of the scheme is substantially reduced. Sure, the rights and privacy of the students are now tightly guarded, but it is doubtful whether the new measure can effectively halt the rising tide of drug abuse in our school system. Public interest may be sacrificed as a result.

In the current consultation, respondents are asked whether parents should be permitted to give consent to release private information about minor children in some circumstances. With school-based drug-testing as a precedent, chances are that our parents from now on will be deprived of traditional parental rights, which will be transferred to minors.

Also under consideration is the question of whether children, in some circumstances, should have the right to request that their personal data be withheld from parents, and whether police should have license to caution parents that their children are at risk of committing criminal offenses. Again, the whole line of thinking is that minors’ privacy will in the future be in the hands of minors themselves.

Minors are by legal definition too young to make decisions on their own. Why all of a sudden are they considered capable of handling their privacy in their own interest and in the interest of the public at large? What then is the place of parenting and family?

The whole idea of protecting the privacy of minors is going much too far, to the point of challenging many of our basic values and undermining the whole fabric of our society.

Going back to the concrete example of voluntary school drug testing, if the rationale of privacy and basic human rights are so sacred, then how can we justify random alcohol testing for drivers? Bear in mind that they are adults, and they have privacy and rights too.

I say this not because I am a nationalist zealot who will opt for home-made products regardless of quality or price, or that I discriminate against Japanese products. I am disappointed that our officials have turned a blind eye to cheaper and better electric cars made by BYD in neighboring Shenzhen. Warren Buffett invested a big chunk in this company. I took a tour of their factory recently and came away thinking the amazing Warren Buffett has done it again in picking the right bet.

The Japanese hybrids are basically conventional cars equipped with batteries charged by a gasoline engine. BYD technology is one step ahead: it produces a fully chargeable electric car with a conventional gas engine as back-up. BYD therefore is closer to full-scale production of electric cars. The conversion is seamless.

The heart of an electric car is its battery. The Japanese and most other manufacturers have adopted the conventional lithium-based battery, which, in mobile telephones, is prone to blow up in collisions or under sudden impact. BYD has developed a much safer iron battery with material that is cheaper and more readily available. The end result is a much cheaper and safer car. In test drives, it is a bit noisy and bumpy, but those drawbacks can easily be remedied and will not enter into the operation of premium models.

Our officials may explain that Japanese cars are made to be driven on the same side of the road as in Hong Kong. But I am sure if we place a batch order, BYD, in the tradition of Chinese manufacturers, will easily supply us with a right-wheel drive model.

The only reason our officials looked elsewhere was their inability to reckon with the fact that many made-in-China products can be as good as the foreign competition, if not better.

With such prejudice on our part, what will people in Shenzhen think? What are the prospects of our integration into the Pearl River Delta regional economy?

While it is not too late to switch, shall we perhaps, at least, adopt a good neighbour approach and try out some home-made electric cars here?

This is the tip of the iceberg. Projects of similar size are now being commissioned in six clusters all over North China, and one along the coast of Zhejiang, with a total planned capacity approaching 120 million kilowatts. These wind farms have to be huge to meet the economic and stability requirements to join the national power grid. Wind energy is now part and parcel of the Chinese national power supply system.

Wind energy is only part of the story. China is now leading the world in clean coal power plants, nuclear plant technology and is also the largest manufacturer of solar voltaic cells. The government has already earmarked 3 trillion yuan ($440 billion) until 2020 for the development of new energy. Compare this figure with the Obama-Biden platform pledge (that is, still words) of $150 billion in the coming decade to make new energy the next growth engine for the US economy, and one can appreciate the determination of the Chinese government in this direction.

By 2020, new energy is expected to constitute 17 percent of the country’s power supply — to the tune of 290 million kilowatts. Of this, 86 million kilowatts will come from nuclear power, 150 million from wind, 20 million from solar power, and 30 million from bio-energy. With such a gigantic commitment, China will no doubt become the world leader in new energy in the coming decade.

New energy is an important component of the now popular low carbon economy. Another equally important component is transportation. In the 11th Five-Year Plan starting 2006, rail transportation has been designated as the major mode for the country, with a total investment of 1.25 trillion yuan in the five-year period. By 2020, there will be 120,000 km of railways crisscrossing the country, of which 16,000 km will be high-speed passenger railway handling trains of over 200 km per hour. In the aftermath of the international financial crisis, investment in rail transportation has been greatly accelerated. A total of 3.5 trillion yuan has been allocated for the next three years — a six-fold increase, and which can never happen in any other country. New figures are yet to be released, but the rate of transformation towards a much lower emission mode of transportation is obviously accelerated.

Even in terms of conventional cars, BYD, a Shenzhen car manufacturer in which Warren Buffett has a stake, is leading the world in hybrid technology. While other cars in the market are oil first and battery second as a back-up, the BYD hybrid is one step ahead. It is a fully chargeable electric car with oil as back-up. Besides, other hybrids use conventional lithium-based batteries which will explode on impact, but BYD has developed an iron battery which is much safer, and uses more readily available and cheaper material. Needless to say, it will be very simple for BYD to switch its production line to electric cars once peripheral facilities such as charging stations are in place. Unlike other industrialized countries, the oil and auto industry’s vested interests are not that powerful, and the auto economy is still in embryonic form. Like Warren Buffett, I am more optimistic about the popularization of electric cars in China.

Another buzz in the now fashionable low carbon economy is “carbon capture and storage technology”. The Western countries have developed this expensive technology, which they themselves cannot afford and are eager to push it to China. The world’s most efficient carbon capture and storage mechanism is photosynthesis through green vegetation. Since 2000 China has been the only developing country that manages to consistently increase its forest coverage. Starting from 16.6 percent in 2000, it is expected to reach 20 percent in 2010, an amazing feat by any account. China is also leading the world in reclaiming farmland from deserts and soil erosion, at a rate of about 3,000 sq km per year — an area larger than Luxembourg. An increasing amount of carbon is being captured and stored this old-fashioned way.

Strictly speaking, per capita wise, China is a low carbon emitting country — less than one-fifth of the Americans — although its total emission is very high in the world. From China’s point of view, water pollution is of a higher priority, because the threats are clear and immediate. As a developing country, China is not subject to any emission target. However, in the current 11th Five-Year Plan, the government has earmarked 500 billion yuan to treat air contamination. The growth rate of greenhouse gases emission has fallen significantly, to 1.5 percent yearly. Starting July 2007, the country stopped all production and importation of chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs), a greenhouse gas much more potent than carbon dioxide, three years ahead of the Montreal Protocol 2010 deadline for developing countries.

Having committed so much on a low carbon economy, China can now take the moral high ground at the Copenhagen Summit to extract more concessions from industrialized countries for the common good.

Ever since the handover, it seems all our civil service cares about is salary. Unlike their counterparts elsewhere in the world, the salary level of our officials is protected by the Basic Law.

But during the last five-year-long recession, when we faced consecutive budget deficits and reserves were dwindling, they resisted salary cuts and worried about their pensions. Needless to say, when the economy rebounded, they were among the first to cry for a pay raise.

Since September last year, Hong Kong has been heading towards another recession. Following examples elsewhere, the Chief Executive announced a small pay cut for himself and other officials. The rest of the civil service resisted following suit and the police even threatened to take to the streets, pressing the government for a separate pay scale. They later softened their stance, awaiting the outcome of the grade structure review in November. Meanwhile, other disciplined forces joined together to negotiate with the government for treatment similar to that given to the police.

We can envisage that once the police have their way, other disciplined forces will follow.

When all disciplined forces come together and the government yields, it is reasonable for all administrative and clerical staff of the disciplined forces to ask for a raise. The final result will be across-the-board pay raises to each and every person working for the government.

As our economy has just come out of recession with 3.3 percent growth and government revenue is expected to increase accordingly, such demands sound all the more “reasonable”.

I am all for people getting a pay raise and have no intention of pitching civil servants against taxpayers. After all, we are all victims of a global recession not of our making.

From the point of view of individual rights and an everyone-for-himself approach, isn’t it also “reasonable” for all citizens to have a bite at the public coffer?

Especially the million or so people now living below the poverty line are well entitled to do so. It is then a matter of which group has a larger crowd and who shouts the loudest.

Is this what we want? What will happen after we have divided up all the public reserves?

I hate to see our government employees, especially our disciplined forces whose responsibility is to protect our property, taking a leading role in this process. It is not good for their public image, to say the least.

With the public interest at heart, I am sure we can work things out. It is up to our top decision makers to come up with a comprehensive pay scheme for our civil servants that is fair and reasonable to all, not just to any one vested interest.