The possibility of distillation of seawater for producing a fresh-water supply has been examined by engineers, but thus far the outlook is discouraging; the cost remains far too high. There is even a faint, faraway hope that some day atomic energy may be employed to distill an unlimited supply of fresh water from the ocean at low cost.
If every phase of Hong Kong’s integrated scheme is in operation by 1970, its water shortage may be over. Similarly, if all the reclamation projects now under consideration are brought to fulfillment in the next decade, there may be enough land to meet all ordinary requirements.
The determination of these requirements, however, will derive from the Department of Public Works only secondarily. The primary determinant will come from the Registry of Marriages.
Any recent visitor to the Central Marriage Registry would appreciate the difficulties in predicting the population of Hong Kong even five years hence; there the walls of two long corridors are so thickly papered with overlapping notices of marriage that not much more than the names and occupations of the prospective couples remain visible.
Neither land nor water is likely to become a surplus commodity in tomorrow’s Hong Kong.
CHAPTER SIX
A New Day for Farms and Fisheries
“On our small and peculiar land area, it would be impossible to reach a high order of self-sufficiency in food production.”