ramsar site

Last decade, the future looked bright for the Deep Bay wetland, in northwest Hong Kong.

The British and Chinese governments agreed to list it under the Ramsar Convention on Wetlands of International Importance – showing they recognised it should be protected by “wise use”.

A slew of globally rare birds occurred each year, and numbers of waterbirds increased to a peak of around 70,000 in winter 1995/1996; great flocks of gulls, ducks and shorebirds treated visitors to what one birdwatcher called, “One of the greatest bird spectacles in Asia.” The Hong Kong Government helped expand the land managed by the World Wide Fund for Nature in the bay’s key reserve, Mai Po Marshes.

But now, many local conservationists are afraid Deep Bay – which is really a shallow estuary – is in steep, perhaps terminal decline.