Hong Kong Development Bureau: Hong Kong will continue to lead supply, establish land reserves, and accelerate and enhance the efficiency of the Northern Metropolis development.

On September 22, regarding the Development Bureau's policy measures in the "Hong Kong First Five-Year Plan" and the "2026 Policy Address," the Secretary for Development, Bernadette Linn, said in her opening remarks that the two documents set out key points for Hong Kong's future development. Hong Kong will continue to lead supply, establish land reserves, accelerate and enhance the efficiency and quality of the Northern Metropolis development, and help promote the yacht economy, make good use of AI, and enhance urban resilience. The "Hong Kong First Five-Year Plan" mentions the need to continue land creation and establish land reserves. The Northern Metropolis (NM) is also covered in a standalone chapter, emphasizing the importance of accelerating and enhancing the efficiency of the NM. In addition to new land creation, this "Five-Year Plan" also mentions the need to promote urban renewal in old districts with new thinking, comprehensively enhance building safety governance, and strengthen urban resilience. First, on continued land creation, the land production output for the next decade was announced last week. It is estimated that the ten-year production of formed land will be about 2,500 hectares, of which 70% will come from the NM. The relevant land use zoning plans will be submitted to the Town Planning Board (TPB) before the end of this year. Next, the priority development area of more than 200 hectares in Ta Kwu Ling, as well as the Au Tau and part of the Ma Tso Lung new development areas, will also be submitted to the TPB, so all planning work should be launched and completed progressively by the end of this year. The target for the next five years is to resume about 680 hectares of land, produce about 900 hectares of formed land, and build about 70,000 public and private housing units on that land. In the first five years, most of these housing units will be public housing. In terms of land use, of these 900 hectares of formed land, it is estimated that more than 400 hectares will be industrial land, accounting for more than 40%, highlighting the importance of industrial development in the NM development. Another about 200 hectares will be residential land, and the rest will be for other infrastructure and community facilities. To keep up with the pace of development, a multi-pronged approach is now needed to accelerate Northern Metropolis construction. The first aspect, and a very important one, is that the "Northern Metropolis Development Bill" has now entered the stage of clause-by-clause scrutiny in the Legislative Council, and the aim is to pass it within this year. The government will then immediately submit the first batch of five subsidiary regulations, hoping that the first batch of facilitation measures mentioned in this legislation will take effect in the first quarter of next year. Another important measure is cost control, which is important for both the government and private participants in construction. The authorities have all along been approaching this from four major aspects: (1) reviewing existing building standards and requirements; (2) actively adopting new procurement models, including the central procurement model, some of which are currently under tender; (3) applying advanced technology and construction techniques; and (4) further streamlining procedures. As the NM planning takes shape and land is produced progressively, different policy bureaux are now taking the lead in building a diversified industrial development system with Hong Kong characteristics, achieving integrated development of education, technology, and talent. For example, the university campus sites in the University Town are led by the Education Bureau; the innovation and technology sites are led by Secretary Sun Dong's Innovation, Technology and Industry Bureau. As for the Development Bureau, this time it has proposed building an advanced construction industry park in the NM, and 30 hectares of land have been reserved for this purpose. The first industrial park will occupy about 10 hectares and is located in South Yuen Long. It is hoped that the market will be invited to submit expressions of interest in the first half of next year, followed by tendering in the first half of 2028. Another 20 hectares will be in the Ta Kwu Ling new development area. The authorities will also continue the diversified development model in the NM. The next target is to strive to put out the Fanling North "area" for tender by the end of this year. Another important element is urban-rural integration. Later this year, the "Northern Metropolis Urban-Rural Integration Guidelines" will be officially announced, and funding of HK$200 million will be sought from the Finance Committee to establish the "Northern Metropolis Urban-Rural Integration Fund." It is hoped that applications will be accepted next year and the first batch of projects approved, making good use of community wisdom. The Development Bureau is currently advancing three land development projects to help promote the yacht economy. The first to be implemented will be the Aberdeen yacht, recreation, and residential integrated development project. The statutory town planning procedures have already begun, with the target of tendering in the first half of next year. The second project will be the former Lamma Quarry site, which will follow closely, and is hoped to be the second tendering project after the Aberdeen project. For the third project in Hung Hom, the authorities are now conducting a detailed technical assessment together with MTR CORPORATION and are also considering the views collected earlier. In addition to discussing new land and new development, reform of the old building maintenance system brooks no delay. At present, as far as the Development Bureau is concerned, work is proceeding intensively on two fronts. First, it is hoped to strengthen regulation of large-scale building maintenance through legislation. The legislation is the "Buildings Ordinance," and it is hoped to submit the amendment bill to the "Buildings Ordinance" to the Legislative Council by the end of the year. Another very important measure is, on the one hand, legislative amendment, and on the other, reforming support for owners carrying out building maintenance. The purpose of this service is to help owners conduct tendering and tender evaluation, and to establish a stricter prequalification system for professionals, contractors, and consultant companies participating in these maintenance projects. As an innovative service, it is hoped that a new name will be given when it is launched in the future, and how to implement and carry out this service will depend on the execution model after the independent committee submits its report in October, and which organization will execute it. One part of this will be launched very soon, because whichever organization executes this enhanced service, it will first need to establish a prequalification list, and it is expected that public applications will be accepted at the end of September. The current target is to have three lists: one for consultants responsible for building inspection, one for consultants supervising works, and the third for contractors carrying out works. Finally, urban resilience also includes making good use of artificial intelligence (AI). Of course, every bureau and department must contribute in this regard. As far as the Development Bureau is concerned, this includes two major areas: enhancing the "Spatial Data Sharing Platform" so that more information is available on this platform for use by various departments and society; and expanding the existing cross-departmental drone management platform and detection work so that the information obtained by these drones can be shared among different works departments; and optimizing works project management through AI.