In order to combat illegal feeding behaviors and ensure environmental hygiene, Hong Kong intends to raise illegal fed fines to HK $ 100,000 (about $ 17,000) and imprisonment for one year.
According to the Hong Kong News Agency, the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region Government published a draft of the Regulations on the 2023 Wildlife Protection (Amendment) regulations on Friday (November 17).The fines of HK $ 10,000 have been raised to a fine of HK $ 100,000 and one year of imprisonment.
In addition, the draft regulations also suggested that the current regulations of feeding wild animals will be extended to covering wild pigeons, and a fixed fine mechanism is introduced to illegal feeding behaviors, and the amount is set to HK $ 5,000.
A spokesman for the Hong Kong Environment and Ecology Bureau said that feeding wildlife and wild pigeons will affect the ability of these animals to forage and survival, and also constitute problems such as public health.The draft regulations aims to improve scarlet power, crack down on illegal feeding behaviors, strengthen protection of wild animals, and ensure environmental hygiene.
The draft regulations will be submitted to the Legislative Council on November 29. The revision of the relevant laws will be passed and will take effect on August 1 next year.
