The Association for Tai O Environment and Development is concerned about the Government's plans to develop Tai O, Hong Kong's last fishing village, in particular the proposal to build a boat anchorage.
The association's members are Tai O residents and we do not want to see the Planning Department take the wrong decisions, which might do ecological harm to the village.
The proposed designation of the large embankment opposite Nam Chung and Fan Kwai Tong, as an anchorage for fishing boats, will have far-reaching implications and we are against it.
We have come to this conclusion after discussing it in the association and talking to villagers and from our knowledge of the area, as long-time residents of Tai O.
The anchorage is unacceptable and impractical, as it will lead to the mangrove replanting area becoming polluted.
Plastic bags and other kinds of refuse will be dumped into the sea from fishing vessels and this will strangle the mangroves and therefore kill them off.
Fish in the mangrove replanting area will eat the refuse and this will kill them. In Yi O stone beach, there are many examples of mangroves being killed by discarded plastic bags from fishing vessels.