Sustainable Living Hong Kong

What’s the mark of a civilised society? A place where people show common courtesy, not just to other people, but also animals.

It’s true the food industry everywhere perpetrates the most unspeakable cruelty on animals to be slaughtered and get away with it, because the cruelty is inflicted out of sight. Animals that are sold as pets and strays though are generally better protected by the law than they are in Hong Kong.

Not only that: while someone reporting an act of cruelty is likely to be ignored, a complaint of animal nuisance is likely to be promptly acted on by the Agriculture, Fisheries and Conservation Department, which was the subject of the audit commissioner’s report for spending HK$30 million on putting down perfectly healthy animals.

Confucius advised us “not to do unto others what you would not wish done unto you” (己所不欲，勿施於人), which is the reverse of the Golden Rule. Surely, if we don’t wish to be confined to a tiny cage, kicked about or otherwise abused, we’d want others to be respected in the same way? That’s why religious scholar Karen Armstrong set up the Charter for Compassion two years ago and urges us all to abide by the Golden Rule (see below). Proper legislation doesn’t only bring the weight of the law to bear on those who abuse animals, but will also serve to educate the public on the importance of animal welfare.

The review of animal welfare legislation jointly conducted by the University of Hong Kong and SPCA is to be welcomed, though it remains to be seen whether the government will respond to its recommendations.

“As a scientist, I try to base my decisions on the scientific facts … and whether it is non-detrimental to the population, and for those reasons I would make a decision on whether to acquire an animal from the wild or not,” Ocean Park’s executive director for zoological operations and education, Suzanne Gendron, told the journalist Simon Parry.

She went on to justify plans to capture wild dolphins by saying that “I believe education is our strongest conservation tool – that connecting our guests with nature, inspiring them to be better stewards for the environment, is the reason we have animals here at Ocean Park…Love of animals and nature is an important part of human make-up…In studies throughout the US in marine parks, 97% of people interviewed find they have a stronger appreciation of the animals and their conservation needs, and a commitment to conservation through seeing live animals…”

Thank you Ms Gendron. Hong Kongers have excellent opportunities to appreciate dolphins and their conservation needs – it’s called Hong Kong Dolphinwatch, and it takes people out to Hong Kong waters to see pink dolphins in their native habitat, not some big tank in a theme park. Hong Kong also has country parks where the buffaloes are never far away, wetlands where the black-face spoonbills forage, and – thanks to an anonymous benefactor’s generosity – a 3,720-square-metre garden where 100 abandoned dogs being cared for by Hong Kong Dog Rescue (HKDR) can now roam.

Interestingly, HKDR founder Sally Andersen noted how happy the dogs were to have so much space, compared to the kennels to which they had been confined previously. “Having so much space makes a huge difference to the dogs. Fights and arguments between dogs happen in confined spaces like the kennels,” she said. And she was talking about domesticated dogs, not wild dolphins.

As for education, 100 volunteers help HKDR make the move from Pok Fu Lam to Tai Po over the weekend, each taking care of one abandoned dog that the charity has saved from death row – actively helping the animals, rather than passively watching them provide ‘entertainment’. What’s the difference between the latter and learning everything from the internet and TV, as Ms Gendron deplored?

Hong Kong has two great institutions: ICAC and the Audit Commission.

Remember what the city was like back in the early 1970s, before the ICAC was set up? A parking fine could be avoided by paying off the traffic policeman and the hospital cleaning staff wouldn’t lift a finger to help a patient unless they got a tip for every little thing. The ICAC changed this culture.

Meanwhile, the Audit Commission has consistently provided taxpayers with grim entertainment through its annual report. This year, it revealed that the Agriculture, Fisheries and Conservation Department had spent HK$30 million on killing innocent animals, despite calls by animal welfare groups for the introduction of far more humane trap-neuter-release programmes.

Unfortunately, as great a service as these two institutions have provided the city, they have been unable to take on investigations that most demand their attention. Subways and footbridges to nowhere are a waste of taxpayers’ money, yes, but these are peanuts compared to the amount spent on things like Disneyland and the Science Park, where the nominal rent makes a mockery of the government’s claim of a non-interventionist policy.

As for the ICAC, developers have hoovered up ordinary Hong Kongers’ money and ploughed them into property projects across the border, winning favours with suitcases of cash.

In the meantime, mainlanders who’ve made millions through means into which it’s best not to delve too deeply are parking the money in properties overseas. Audrey Eu was right to query, at last week’s Legislative Council meeting, the wisdom of the Capital Investment Entrant Scheme, which allows anyone with no less than HK$6.5 million to “invest” in Hong Kong in order to qualify for residency. It’s perfectly permissible to “invest” it in real estate – which means it’s kind of legal to launder ill-gotten gains.

Mainlanders are not only doing it in Hong Kong; they’re doing it everywhere, paying in cash and pricing out locals – putting themselves on course to become the most resented people in the world. So while financial institutions around the world are on guard due to anti-money laundering legislation, money is laundered anyway.

Despite calls for measures to address the wealth gap, only band-aids – new rules governing show flats, letters demanding explanation from developers – have been applied. It’s strangely appropriate that Hong Kong economic students should continue to lap up the neoliberal ideology propounded by Steven Cheung, a Chicago school economist wanted by the US for tax evasion; and no alternative vision is ever considered.

If somebody takes a child from an overpopulated country for use as slave labour with no freedom of movement and no guarantee the child will be able to cope in an alien environment, would they be able to justify the action by arguing the child comes from a “sustainable source”?

Well of course not; they will be prosecuted for human trafficking. But not only are other living beings not accorded the same right to humane treatment, we like to claim them all as our legitimate property, to be bought or sold for our profit. Countering claims that Ocean Park has been involved in the capture of wild dolphins for export in the Solomon Islands, both the theme park’s chairman, Allan Zeman, and chief executive, Tom Mehrmann, having denied this, said they would only import dolphins from there if it is established the country has a “sustainable source” of the animals. Mehrmann was quoted in the SCMP report to say: “If there is a sustainable source we would look into whether we can get permits to import dolphins but it is a very long process.”

Does that make the presence of Ocean Park staff in Solomon Islands waters all right? Who granted the Solomon Islands rights to give out permits for the dolphins? God? Based on their logic, it’s kosher to capture the animals if their population is sustainable, then, is it?

Ever seen the animated film Happy Feet? Remember how the captured penguin felt, and how he discovered the animals he encountered at the theme park to which he was sent were passive because they had in fact all gone crazy?

Cruelty is inherent in the whole idea of capturing wild animals for human entertainment, because these animals exist as part of Earth’s biodiversity, not to be forced to go through silly routines for our amusement. As SPCA executive director Sandy Macalister said in the same report, “it is a trade that shouldn’t exist”. It’s bad enough that Hong Kong is the hub of the shark’s fin trade – which the government would only address if the sharks involved come from endangered species; in the case of Ocean Park, the government is the direct owner of the facility, with a direct hand in the perpetration of cruelty on animals.

Enlightened countries from Britain to Bolivia have banned or are looking to ban animal circuses because of the cruelty involved and the same should be applied to marine animals, but will the Hong Kong government give up on a nice income-earner like Ocean Park, which it is expanding at the expense of the flora and fauna that once covered that part of the south side of Hong Kong Island? That’s extremely doubtful indeed – even though, animal cruelty aside, it’s highly questionable why a government that’s purportedly in favour of free trade should have a hand in running a theme park at all.

It’s all part of the contradiction that shows expediency more than anything determines government policy. When it proves profitable for its agency, for example, to expand the Hong Kong Convention and Exhibition Centre, then it’s quite happy to ignore the principles of free trade and trump the private sector investors losing money on the rival Asia World-Expo.

We’d like to think that the slave trade was abolished long ago, when in fact it’s thriving to this day, in factories around the world. And offices, too, in fact, though we make-believe we are enjoying status and spending power. We too have been captured but tricked into thinking we’re free; maybe that’s why the dolphins’ plight is hard for some to understand.

“The Cove”, a documentary on the annual dolphin hunt in the Japanese town of Taiji, has won the Oscar for best documentary.

Every year dolphins are corralled into a bay and slaughtered in the town, but Taiji mayor Kazutaka Sangen protested at the film being awarded the Oscar, arguing that the hunt was legal in Japan and part of its traditional culture.

It’s amazing how “traditional culture” is always invoked when people seek to defend inhumane practices. They never seem to remember that human sacrifices were also part of many traditional cultures but are no longer practised, for obvious reasons.

Today’s Sunday Post leader made a good link between the accident at Seaworld in Florida, the US, where a killer whale killed its trainer; and the same practice of keeping wild marine animals at Ocean Park for our entertainment.

It’s been years since it became unacceptable in advanced economies to abuse animals by subjecting them to circus routines. Yet, for some strange reason, this is still accepted when the animals concerned roam the sea and not land.

The leader supports the call “for independent oversight of [Ocean Park's] treatment of animals, and to be transparent about animal deaths and the causes.”

The real issue is, how come we’ve got captive animals for our entertainment at all? This is not the only problem with Ocean Park: the redevelopment itself is recognised for “major impacts on landscape resources … from the substantial excavation and construction of ‘The Summit’, which involves an extensive area of Nam Long Shan… Even with the implementation of mitigation measures, there will still be adverse impacts to the existing landscape characters.”

And yet the adverse impact is considered “acceptable” according to the environmental impact assessment from which the quote is taken; even though an entire hill has been levelled for the expansion.

Ocean Park, of course, is part of the government’s ill-conceived strategy to increase tourism’s contribution to the GDP.

Think about the Crystal Bear-winning film “Echoes of the Rainbow”. Notice how film audiences love Hong Kong films with a tinge of nostalgia? Tourists do too. They love visiting historical places.

And yet, at the same time the government is keen to make Hong Kong’s film industry more competitive, it is systematically destroying the locations – such as Wing Lee Street in Sheung Wan, which served as the background for Alex Law’s film – that attract film crews and tourists alike. Such authentic locations are replaced with artificial ones like theme parks and humongous shopping malls.

As more and more real estate is given over to the construction of hotels and expensive malls to cater to nouveau riche mainlanders on whose largesse the government’s decided to depend for the city’s economic survival, the prices for rents and goods are hiked for the locals, exacerbating the wealth gap.

But Disney is setting up shop in Shanghai and luxury brands are flocking to all the main Chinese cities. Pretty soon the likes of the hurdler Liu Xiang won’t need to wait for a trip to Hong Kong to load up on jewellery and LV bags. And then where would Hong Kong be?

Misguided “cat fanciers” have decided to push for a cat park in Hong Kong, where, like dogs, they can have a space for enjoying “outdoor activities”.

But get this: cats are different from dogs. Dogs are pack animals that will follow their leader and roam and play as instructed. Cats, on the other hand, are solitary, highly territorial animals. In the wild, they will leave their families to look for their own territories as soon as they become adults, even though some stay together because there is a concentrated supply of food.

For indoor cats, the house or flat is their territory. Unless they have grown up together in the same house or flat, being stuck in the same territory means war. Cats forced to move house/flat take a long time to get used to the idea of the new surroundings being their territory, and some can be so traumatised they undergo complete personality changes.

A cat park would be alien territory to them and being made to “play” with other cats would cause tremendous STRESS, not delight at the opportunity for recreation! The people behind the campaign for a cat park suffer from anthropomorphising syndrome: they think cats are like human beings that need to play in strange places and meet “friends”; when in fact they are an entirely different species.

Yes, ideally cats should have the freedom to roam in the big outdoors, which is why the SPCA’s Cat Colony Care Programme is so good, because it desexes strays and re-releases them in their familiar territories, where there are carers to look after them. When that is not possible, they are homed. Desexed cats require much smaller territories so flats are not a problem, but they are curious creatures and do like to play with their owners. A happy cat is one that gets its owner’s regular attention, a scratching post or two and plenty of exercise – with simple playthings that don’t cost a bundle at the pet shop.

A cat park will be a source of suffering, not fun.

A shark fin trader offered a classic defence when confronted with the fact that more than 20% of his stock came from endangered species.

Mak Ching-po, who is chairman of the Hong Kong Dried Seafood and Grocery Merchants Association, called the prospect of extinction a myth perpetuated by environmentalists and argued that “shark populations will grow exponentially if we don’t keep fishing them.” And that, for him, means we won’t get any garoupas either because the sharks will eat them all.

Wow. And this is the chairman of a lobby group! He cares nothing for the cruelty of finning, and wants his listener to think sharks are competing with humans for fish. Does he really not know the importance of large predators in maintaining the health of the marine food chain? Worse still, imagine how many of their customers they have inculcated with the same ideas.

Does he really believe what he said, or is it just ignorance? In any case, this shows what a big job WWF, Greepeace and others have on their hands. Issuing a sustainable seafood guide and working with school caterers are all great ideas, but a big educational push is needed to help consumers understand how the marine food chain works and why our eating habits are unsustainable.

I’ve said previously that many marine species will disappear within our lifetime because of our refusal to change our habits. Activists have, for example, tried to put pressure on sushi restaurants such as Nobu to stop serving bluefin tuna, with little success, and with the decision taken by the International Commission for the Conservation of Atlantic Tunas (Iccat) not to ban fishing of this big fish until stock recovers, one species will disappear from the Mediterranean in two years’ time.

Don’t believe what’s happening? Find a DVD of The End of the Line.

The British Government has closed a loophole that has allowed fishermen to continue the practice of shark finning: removing a shark’s fins then throwing it back into the water to drown or be eaten alive by other fish.

Shark finning has been on the rise due to Asian demand for shark’s fin soup. The practice is not only cruel; it threatens to render many species of shark extinct, which will have implications for the entire marine food chain and therefore the sustainability of the oceans.

Europe is now hoping to achieve a continent-wide ban on the practice by persuading Spain and Portugal to institute a ban as well, but efforts to stem supply won’t solve the problem, because continued demand, particularly in the face of reduced supply, will only spur fishermen to carry on illegally.

Would anyone want to have their limbs cut off and be thrown away to be eaten by other animals? No. So why should anyone want shark’s fin soup?

Jill Robison of Animals Asia has sent out an appeal for animal lovers to write a polite letter to the Chinese embassy asking for an immediate stop to the Hanzhong cull and an end to cruel dog culls throughout China, and to ask the Chinese authorities to work with Animals Asia to introduce effective, lasting and humane anti-rabies measures.

The appeal came in response to a cull in northwest Shaanxi Province that has already seen as many as 30,000 dogs brutally slaughtered on the streets of Hanzhong and surrounding areas. This is one in 10 of the city’s dogs. For more information check Animals Asia’s website (link on right).

Embassy addresses are available here.