The Agricultural, Fisheries and Conservation Department spent a total of HK$13.8 million in 2019-2020 to deal with the wild boar problem, a 39% increase from the HK$9.9 million in 2018-2019. The number of complaints dropped slightly. As of January this year, 950 complaints concerning hunting or harassment of wild boars have been received in , which is similar to the 1,008 complaints in the previous year; .
According to the Environmental Bureau, the AFCD launched a pilot project using infrared automatic cameras to estimate the number of wild boars in rural areas. Based on the population density of the pilot wild boars, it is estimated that there are approximately 1,800 to 3,300 wild boars in the rural areas of Hong Kong. In the past three years, the AFCD received 787, 1008 and 950 complaints of wild boar infestation or nuisance in 2017-2018, 2018-2019 and 2019-2020 respectively (as of January). The area with the most wild boars this year was Southern District, with 190 cases; followed by Sai Kung, where a total of 137 complaints were received; Sha Tin District, and Central and Western District, also had 97 related complaints each.
In 2019-2020, the AFCD’s task force on wild boar management had a total of 26 people working for it, an increase of 12 people from 2018-2019. The agency plans to spend HK$23.7 million on wild boar management in 2020-2021. The manpower will increase by five to 31 people, and continue to use contraception or sterilisation for wild boars and relocate them to remote rural areas. They will also strengthen educational activities to promote the message to stop feeding wild boars.
AFCD has run a pilot project on wild boar capture and contraception or relocation since the end of 2017. As of February this year, AFCD has injected 114 female wild boars with contraceptive vaccines, performed sterilisation on 56 wild boars, and relocated 323 wild boars to remote rural areas. The expenditure on these programmes in the past three years were HK$3.8 million, HK$6.2 million and HK$6.8 million respectively.
The AFCD ’s expenditure on public education and publicity work (revised budget) for stopping wild boar feeding was HK$ 830,000. The expenditure was mainly for hiring contractors to organise educational activities and produce promotional materials. As of January 2020, the contractor has organised a total of 55 outdoor education exhibitions, 18 country park wildlife guides, 31 education lectures and 6 roving exhibitions.
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