For over 40 years, WWF-Hong Kong has been at the forefront of conservation efforts, addressing environmental challenges across our city’s terrestrial, marine and atmospheric domains (land, sea and air). Like before, this year, our dedicated mission to protect natural habitats, improve human wellbeing and cultivate a thriving environment continued to evolve, reaching new achievements from our initiatives.

We marked the first anniversary of completing the Mai Po Peter Scott Infrastructure Upgrade Project. The new Peter Scott Visitor Centre has emerged as a hub for wetland conservation, research, education, and community engagement. Its enhanced facilities are strengthening our wetland training programmes and developing local and regional expertise.

Based on Nature-based Solutions (NbS), we initialled effort to promote the ecological value of wetlands to stakeholders across the city and the Greater Bay Area (GBA). We particularly focus on the Northern Metropolis development projects, hoping

to implement and apply these solutions. Our collaborative strategies have united diverse stakeholders, such as the Hong Kong Institute of Landscape Architects (HKILA) and the Hong Kong Institute of Architects (HKIA), to develop innovative, practical solutions that will benefit Mai Po and its surrounding communities, reaffirming our long-standing commitment to wetland conservation and local biodiversity preservation.

In the marine sector, we focused on ecosystem revitalisation through NbS, with particular emphasising the restoration of coral communities and seagrass beds – key components of maintaining marine ecosystem balance. At the biodiverse Shui Hau sandflat in southern Lantau, we strengthened our community engagement elements and implemented innovative visitor and habitat management solutions, which we plan to extend to other critical marine sites in the near future.

Despite this year’s efforts, progress towards global agreements aimed at placing nature on a recovery path by 2030 has been insufficient. Our latest Living Planet Report, reveals a catastrophic 73% decline in the average size of monitored wildlife populations in just fifty years (1970 and 2020). Therefore, the coming five years will require unprecedented collective action to tackle both climate and biodiversity crises.

Systemic change is essential to reverse biodiversity loss. We will continue to serve as a bridge between conservation and development, inspiring stakeholders to drive innovative and practical conservation initiatives. We call on every sector of society to join us in our vital mission: Ensuring a sustainable natural environment for generations to come.

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