At first glance, where do you think this is?
Amsterdam?
Nope, guess again.

It’s Hong Kong!

Yesterday, I went to the well-known Lake Egret Nature Park (小白鷺) in Tai Po with my childhood friend Eunice Yan. It has been rehabilitated into a European style restaurant, surrounded by tulip fields. We were stunned by the beauty of the field. Owner of the floral shop told us he oversees the restaurant and grew tulips to beautify the area.

Advocating for sustainable local tourism at V’air Hong Kong for over five years, I often reflect on the true meaning of “sustainable tourism”.

This is clearly the making of a successful touristic site. The tulips attracted wide media coverage and led to long queues outside the restaurant, putting up joyful faces of on the old and the young, granting them sense of fulfilment when outbound travel is restricted.

“Society” and “Economy” – checked!

Now it comes to “Environment”. This area used to be a prime site for watching woodland birds. With the “phototaking is prime” mentality of Hong Kong citizens, beautifying the environment can serve as means to capture attention in the first place, then promote educational initiatives related to conservation. However, the intrinsic ecological value may be overshadowed by the tulips, which likely require a carbon-intensive growth process because they are meant to be grown under cold weather.

Raising general public’s awareness on the intrinsic ecological value of the park is definitely something V’air, as an environmental education group, can do through content creation and distribution. All in all, I believe as local tourism thrives, more discussions need to happen to shape the future of sustainable tourism in urban-rural continuums.