Chief Executive Chui Sai On met the Secretary of the Chinese Communist Party’s Guangdong Provincial Committee Hu Chunhua on Friday, and revealed that Macau will be working closely with the province in 2015 regarding waste disposal issues.
The closed door meeting took place at the Zhudou Guest House in Guangzhou. The CE was accompanied by the Secretary for Economy and Finance, Lionel Leong, and Raimundo do Rosário, the Secretary for Transport and Public Works. Zhu Xiaodan, the Governor of Guangdong province, was also present.
At the beginning of the meeting, when members of the press were allowed to observe for several minutes, both Mr Hu and Mr Chui gave a brief introduction on the economic condition of the province and the SAR based on 2014 conditions.
The CE thanked Hu for the support Guangdong has given Macau in the previous year. “With the signing of the Guangdong-Macau Cooperation Framework Agreement, we have rolled out the detailed tasks [relating to the framework]. We have achieved the objectives of last year,” he said.
“In the upcoming year, we hope to further our work based on these well-established foundations. It is especially [so] that we are paying high attention to the Guangdong Free Trade Zone. We have been studying the related documents in the past two days [and hope that] we can strengthen our collaboration [with Guangdong],” he said.
The CE added that the free trade zone will give Macau a great opportunity for expansion, and hopes to put it into the agenda of the Cooperation Framework Agreement’s annual meeting, which he said will help both parties to decide how to further collaborate with each other.
Moreover, Chui described Macau and Guangdong’s relationship as brotherly, with the latter supporting the needs of Macau residents, such as in the supply of utilities and food.
The CE also mentioned Guangdong’s support for Macau’s waste disposal issues. “I am very glad that we can put several work plans into action, especially on… the handling of [Macau’s] inert waste and unwanted vehicles. This will [help] the hard work by [Macau and Guangdong] in these few years to be actualized,” Chui said, adding that he would like Macau to sign more agreements with Guangdong during this year’s Framework Agreement annual meeting.
After the meeting, which lasted around 30 minutes, the CE and the two secretaries met with the media briefly. He said that in the rest of the meeting, representatives from the MSAR and Guangdong province reviewed the collaboration between the two regions in 2014, and looked into furthering the cooperation. “Generally, both of us [saw] that we have achieved the objectives related to collaboration in the previous year that are set in the Guangdong-Macau Cooperation Framework Agreement and in the Framework Agreement’s annual meeting,” he said.
“In forecasting future collaboration, especially the collaboration in this year, we have noticed the announcement of [the establishment of] the Guangdong Free Trade Zone and Macau will, under the Framework Agreement… expend its cooperation with Guangdong,” he said.
The CE also said that, after a lengthy discussion with the mainland authorities in previous years, Macau will be working more closely with Guangdong in handling Macau’s inert waste and unwanted vehicles. “We believe that we [will achieve our objectives] in this year,” he said. “We are going to announce the details when the condition is [right].” The CE added that the administration will strive to make the announcement within this year.
macau landfill long overflowed
As early as June 2014, the Environmental Protection Bureau (DSPA) had already suggested that Macau’s construction material landfill “[had] basically reached its full capacity.” The then acting director of the bureau, Vong Man Hung, suggested that the authorities would resolve the issue through regional cooperation and the establishment of a new construction waste recycling center in the upcoming years. Although the center has not yet been built, the bureau has already selected some “high quality construction waste” and temporarily stored it near the landfill. Macau also had to negotiate with mainland authorities in deciding the types of construction waste that could be sent to the mainland for recycling or other treatments. According to Macau Daily, DSPA has already reserved funds in its 2015 budget for the construction of an inert waste recycling facility.
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