Analysts have warned that Hong Kong needs to overcome significant political and technical barriers if it wants to participate in the emerging mainland market for emissions trading.
Chief among the potential hurdles for cross-border emissions trading are differences in the markets on the mainland and in the SAR and varying environmental standards and approaches to enforcing anti-pollution measures.
The general lack of interest in emissions trading previously shown by Hong Kong financial market executives and Environmental Protection Department (EPD) officials also needed to be reversed.
Former legislator Christine Loh Kung-wai said a seminar she organised in 1998 on emissions trading failed to arouse the interest of market players and environmental officials.
'EPD was very sceptical, people here in the markets were very sceptical,' she said. 'It shouldn't be such a big leap from trading bundles of metal to trading emissions.'
Hong Kong Exchanges and Clearing said it was 'actively looking for opportunities to develop new products' but failed to say what it was doing to investigate the potential of emissions trading.
Ms Loh interpreted the exchange operator's response to the South China Morning Post as an indication it had done little. 'Hong Kong Exchanges need to update themselves in what is happening in this area,' she said.
