On September 6, the forum "Imagine Hong Kong: Towards a Clean Sky, Towards Zero Emissions" was held in Asia Society Hong Kong Center. The forum was jointly organized by AECOM and the Asia Society. The forum gathered more than 100 participants from government, domestic and international experts, enterprises, and NGOs, with the focus on how to achieve sustainable urban development and city prosperity in 2060.
Mr. Ronnie Chan, Chairman of the Asia Society Hong Kong Centre, Mr. Sean CHIAO, President of AECOM (Asia Pacific), Mr. Wong Kam-sing, Director of the Environment Bureau of the HKSAR government, and other distinguished guests and representatives from enterprises, NGOs, the government and domestic and foreign experts had participated in the meeting. Particularly, the Forum also invited the special guests Goh Chok Tong, former Prime Minister of Singapore, to participate in closed-door discussions. Mr. Tonny Xie, BCAA Director, was invited to participate the panel discussion of the event.
The forum was opened by remarks from Mr. Sean Chiao, and he addressed that the exchange and cooperation of advanced ideas in various fields has become the key to achieving clear skies for future cities. AECOM is a global network of experts which is dedicated to developing and implementing innovative solutions to meet the World's most complex challenges. At the meeting, the participants emphasized and summed up three key points in the restoring blue skies, which are layout integration planning, encouraging cooperation and openness, and innovation sharing across borders. Mr. Wong Kam-sing, Director of the Environment Bureau of the HKSAR government, introduced the Hong Kong's climate action Blueprint 2030+, which was released last year. Mr. Wong highlighted that urban planning and design programs could be used in conjunction with transport management to improve the effectiveness of good air quality and enhance the overall function and the community well-being. Additionally, in recent years, Hong Kong has made great progress in air pollution control, energy conservation and emission reduction. The Hong Kong Government is not alone, and the Cross-regional pollution control project has been launched to improve the environment in the Greater Bay Area. Wong Kam-sing also said the government welcomed the emergence of new technologies in the field of pollution control.
Mr. Xie shared the significant progress of China's blue sky defense war on the forum. When answering the question of whether Hong Kong's future development can be synchronized with clean air and economic growth, Mr. Xie highlighted that to achieve Win-Win, the most important thing is the change of mind. “How we could treat air quality improvement a real opportunity for economic growth, rather than burden. How we could encourage young talents to pursue their success on wealth and life through green innovations.”
"Imagine 2060: Delivering Tomorrow’s Cities Together" is a three-year cooperative project between the AECOM and the Asia Society, since 2017. Activities with different environmental themes have been held in some cities. The theme of 2018 annual event is about "clear sky", which provides a channel for a series of dialogues in three Asia-Pacific cities (Delhi, Melbourne and Hong Kong) to envision a sustainable future. The " Imagine Hong Kong: Towards a clean sky, Towards Zero Emissions " is the third forum of the 2018 serial dialogues.
