Objectives

This mega-project ultimately aims to provide scientific information to inform conservation management in the Tolo area. There are seven specific objectives of the project:

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1. To build a multidisciplinary team which will foster capacity building among scientists, the local fishermen community and relevant stakeholders for intellectual discussion, knowledge exchange, research collaboration and to achieve consensus in recommendations made;

2. To create a central, catalogued species inventory (including both the Site of Special Scientific Interests (SSSI) in Ting Kok, and the Tolo area) for scientific, conservation and educational purposes;

3. To document temporal and spatial variations in marine biodiversity in the study area and understand site specific variations of marine biodiversity in various typical habitats;

4. To identify species and biological communities, in particular those that are threatened, rare or endemic to Hong Kong in the study area;

5. To identify hotspot(s) of marine biodiversity and site(s) of special value based on the results of this proposed study and on relevant studies in other coastal areas in Hong Kong;

6. To assess the economic value of marine resources in the study area; and

7. To establish this study as a template of good practice (i.e., by generating a set of standardised, scientifically sound methods) for future biodiversity assessments (e.g., EIAs, ecological monitoring programmes, etc.) in Hong Kong’s marine communities in order to achieve the goal of better monitoring and management of ecological resources addressed by the Biodiversity Strategy and Action Plan (BSAP) under the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD).

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