4. Major activities of the project
The project will focus into researching for a strategy of raising the public awareness on Evironmental Education. With a view to facilitate the collaborators in the implementation of action agenda the project will developed two kinds of educational materials for raising awareness of secondary students and an entire community.
4.1 To develop appropriate educational materials for the sustainable management of the environment
Preliminary research works will conduct to formulate of a regional strategy on environmental education. The continuation of our research work led to the publication of the book about environmental condition in Hong Kong for example the situation of air pollution, energy and solid waste. The book will be a compilation of status reports from Hong Kong Government, Universities and different NGOs concerning Environmental Protection. Information about successful examples, including educational materials, will be collected. It documents exemplary cases of environmental standard in the region and provides an overall the patterns of environmental issue in the region and looks at how environmental education is moving towards for sustainability. The book also makes recommendations to promote regional cooperation, capacity building and mobilisation of resources in environmental education. It would be serving as the tool of Environmental Education and a basis of further educational materials.
The next step is developing educational materials for natural habitat conservation. Education is an important strategy for habitat conservation. In order to enhance people’s awareness of wetlands, some “package style” materials will be developed and used through trials and in practice. For example organising some visit to natural habitat like Long Yuen Wetland or MaiPo for secondary school student or families in Hong Kong. The Project will cooperate with organizations related with the habitat conservation for example the World Wild Fund Hong Kong. And some environmental institution like i) Air quality control center at Centralii) Waste separation and transport center in Hong Kong Island iii) Environmental resources visitors center
Action would be taken to make the public making sense of climate change. A booklet will be decided aims at raising awareness of secondary school students about climate change and its impact on different ecosystems. It attempts to enhance their understanding towards global efforts and responses. It is written in simple and easy-to-understand language. Furthermore, the general public also can benefit from the use of the booklet.
4.2 Undertake a training programme to develop the capacity of human resources to deal with the environmental issues in the region
The training program “Environmental Education Training for Teaching Staffs in Hong Kong” will be implemented. Target trainees will include administrative staffs of government NGOs as well as school teachers. It major objectives are as follows: (1) deepen the understanding and knowledge of the environment and environmental education, (2) improve the management ability of Government and NGOs, (3) build a network of relevant NGOs and other institutions , and (4) provide hands-on information and know-how on environmental education. Problem-solving techniques such as lectures, hands-on activities, observations and discussions were used to give the first-hand training to the participants.
4.3 Development of innovative Environmental Education model
Research will be conducted to present an innovative form of environmental education for example an ecotourism model that is based on economic measures in order to achieve sustainable development of natural and social. It explores ways to distribute benefits of eco-tourism equitably in the community. As part of the case study, in-depth socio-economic information is being collected. To build community support for conservation, the projects have been developed that aim to improve the local community’s understanding of biodiversity by engaging local teachers and stakeholders in marketable environmental education activities. It is hoped that these activities will help advance local ecotourism development and benefit a wide range of local people. The best way to overcome barriers between locals and managers of protected areas is to involve people in planning and participating in activities in the protected area. In the awareness-raising and learning process, the opportunity to share opinions, examples, and perspectives with different stakeholders is a very powerful success factor.
Eco-tourism is comprehensive activity which has many subjects such as advancement of economic independence, promotion of basic education. It is not only the scheme expecting economic efficacy but also a nucleus force of environmental education in the fields.
In the process of implementing this communication and education process, the following steps were taken:
• Meetings and conferences with stakeholders interested in ecotourism development in the protected areas;
• Recruiting and training a team of teachers to become guides for tours incorporating environmental education programmes;
• Creating tourism programmes with environmental education elements; and
• Testing the educational content of created ecotours in the field and exchanging experiences
5. Ecotourism in Hong Kong
5. 1 The potential of ecotourism in Hong Kong
Hong Kong occupies a very small area of only about 1100 km2, but it has in fact urbanized only about 17% of its land area, and over 40% of the territory is protected as country parks, special area, and Ramsar site, this is probably the highest in the world in percentage term. It also has more species of animals and plants than some European countries like United Kingdom & Northern Ireland. Some of them are endemic to the territory, and a number of plant and animal species are classified as globally or regionally rare and endangered. Mai Po and Inner Deep Bay are some of the most important coastal wetlands in east Asia where about three hundred species of bird are recorded and several hundred thousand water birds use it as wintering site or stop-over place during migration Among them, about a quarter of the entire world population of the globally endangered Black-faced Spoonbill stay there in winter. Therefore, it has a high potential for establishing ecotourism in its territory. However, due to the lack of knowledge on the subject and interest from the tourism industry in the past, the eco-tourism potential of the city has not been fully explored. The project will aimed at injecting a new prospect of environmental education inside ecotourism in Hong Kong.
Despite its small area of Hong Kong, it has many remarkable arrays of landforms: precipitous peaks, deep valleys, indented coasts and numerous islands which are some of South China’s most striking and valuable natural landscape. The natural setting give people impressive experience and also embrace a variety of ecological habitats and a very diverse animals and plant species, essential for the development of eco-tourism.
5.2 Constraints and limitations
Strong seasonal factors – its sub-tropical monsoon climate cause unsatisfactory condition in specific seasons. Summer in Hong Kong is very hot and humid, hence it may not be suitable for land-based outdoor activities, such as hiking, birdwatching. And in fact there are few bird species reside in the territory over the summer. On the other hand it is the best time for dolphin watching and sea going.
Small absorptive capacity of ecological sensitive areas, - the number of visitors is fairly restrictive because of this reason, the annual quota for students and visitors to our Ramsar site at Mai Po Marshes is 50,000only. This is far inadequate to meet the future demands of eco-tourism.
Insufficient information and guidance, lacking professional tour guides – As eco-tourism is still a fairly new concept to the local tourism industry, there are very few published materials and professional tour guides currently available in the market. However the situation will be improved gradually as the eco-tourism industry grows. There is a need to ‘repackaging’ of existing heritage, cultural and natural attractions in parallel with the development of new ones, and greater endeavor to secure and expand on Hong Kong’s ‘consumer-friendly’ gateway.
Lacking a proactive conservation policy – Although Hong Kong has a very well developed Country Parks System, the government does not have a conservation policy which would allows her to resume or purchase lands under private ownerships for conservation purpose. And that makes many ecological important areas vulnerable to development pressure.
6. Planning for the project
The research schedules of the Project for is presented below:
6.1 Stage One
• Collect pioneering examples of Environmental Education, from Hong Kong
• Gather Environmental Education materials used.
• Identify the best sites to undertake field works on eco-tourism education.
• Prepared an awareness-raising material on climate change and its impact on the society.
• Organise trips for students.
6.2 Stage Two
• The Environmental Education materials will be completed
•Continues to work on the package of community-based educational materials on conservation.
• Collaborate with NGOs and Travel Industries to run pilot tests on eco-tourism.
• Training courses for government and NGOs staffs for Environmental Education
• Training courses for local stakeholders to be engaged in eco-tourism
• Conduct preliminary field research in order to select several communities for eco-tourism
6.3 Stage Three
• Program development and trial of eco-tourism. Field studies will be done in the selected community, and problems will be identified.
• Revise and test the package of community-based education materials.
• Prepare an innovative eco-tourism education model.
• Revise and update the regional strategy to meet the needs of the rapidly changing society.
7. In-house Staffing
1. Project Leader(1 person): Responsible for the overall management of the Project.
2. Research Fellow(2 persons): To support the Project Leader in running the Project and be
responsible for overall progress of the Project.
3. Operation staff(1 person): To support the Project Leader and other Research Fellows and have responsibility partly in running the project. Will also manage the research of developing environmental education materials or collecting environmental education information.
4. Secretary(one person): to provide the overall logistical support necessary for operation of the Project.
5. Others(include other staffs, lecturers and volunteers)
8. Project Management
Basically, the Project Leader assumes of the responsibility for the overall management of the Project. The Project Leader coordinated and managed daily activities and attempted to maintain a harmonious environment within the project.
9. Expected External Funds
The Project will endeavor to procure funds from the following source:
1) Council of Sustainable development: Operation of the Sustainable Development Fund of Council for sustainable development
2) World Wild Fund in Hong Kong
3) Friends of the Earth (HK)
4) Green Power
5) Green Council
10. Project Budget(exclude salary and operation cost)
The estimated budget is given below:
Development of Environmental Education materials
HK$100,000
Promotion of training courses
HK$50,000
Proposal for innovative model
HK$100,000
Other (Collection of information / Revision of the strategies / Collection of environmental education resources / Strengthening networking/ Research on related issue )
HK$250,000
Total:
HK$500,000
11. Evaluation of achievements
11.1 Influence on policy-making processes
The Project is striving to have a positive influence on policy-making processes in the field of environmental education. It will take active and productive steps towards the formulation of a draft framework for a regional implementation scheme for Education of Sustainable Development. The Project tries to promote the idea among the policy-makers, to identify and advocate eco-tourism attractions were recently carried out by the Hong Kong Tourist Association. Another Project’s initiative can be seen in the implementation of the regional strategy that it prepared by different countries and its endorsement by regional organisations.
11.2 Timeliness in terms of stakeholders’ needs
The regional strategy prepared by the Project was timely, because no plan of action on environmental education for the region existed before its formulation. There were many sub-regional plans, but not one for the whole region. The preparation of the community-based educational package is new and unique in the sense that it takes the holistic approach in raising the environmental awareness of an entire community. This was a creative and unique thing in the field of environmental education, also the first of its kind. The establishment of a network of environmental NGOs and government would be another successful promotion of environmental education activities in the region.
11.3 Uniqueness, originality, and effectiveness
The community-based educational package is original in the sense that it attempts to meet the needs of the entire community in raising awareness and that the contents are organised in a systematic manner. All these reveal the originality of the idea and of the project’s activities in environmental education. In order to enhance public awareness of resource conservation and to promote the income generation capacity of local communities, the eco-tourism research also contains elements of uniqueness and originality. Conservation was considered to be an instrument or force for realising sustainable development.
12.Reference
- Ashworth, J.M., Corlett, R. Dudgeon, D., Melville, D. and Tang, Winnie (1993) Hong Kong Flora and Flauna: Computing Conservation, World Wide Fund for Nature Hong Kong, pp.24.
- Beeton, S. (1998) Eco-tourism: A Practical Guide for Rural Communities. Collingwood, Australia: Landlinks Press.
- Dudgeon, D. and Corlett, R. (1994) Hills and Streams: an ecology of Hong Kong, Hong Kong University Press, pp.234.
-
Heng Seng Economic Monthly (1998) The Tourism Industry - A Slow Year in 1998.
- Hong Kong Business Annual 2000 (2000) Tourism: Welcome Back, 123-127, Communication Management Ltd.
- Hong Kong Government (1999) Annual Report 1999, Government Information Services.
- Stokes E. (1999) Exploring Hong Kong’s Countryside: a visitor’s companion, Hong Kong Tourist Association, 184 pp.
- Wen Wei Po Daily (2000). Special Discussion on the Prospects of Hong Kong’s Tourism Industry. B8 – July 6, 2000.
- WWFHK (1994) Conservation of Hong Kong’s Biodiversity - A Time to Act, unpublished report, World Wide Fund for Nature Hong Kong.
