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6.3 Aggressively Streamline Approval

              Pr ocesses and De v elopmen t
              Procedures



                     As things stand, we are of the view that the land and housing
              development process are simply too lengthy and time-consuming. For
              private sector development, we reiterate our call for an in-depth review
              and optimisation of the approval processes of the relevant government
              departments.

                     In this regard, we are happy to see that the Development Bureau
              has communicated with the industry to discuss a set of improvements
              to the current approval mechanism. Some of the discussed proposals are
              similar to what we have raised in our first Research Report, for example
              a set of clearly pre-defined parameters (“Core Points”) to be included
              in the approval of the “Design, Deposition and Height” submission and
              a standardised format of “Master Layout Plan” in accordance with the
              Practice Note. We hope that the government could actively strive to follow-
              up with these proposals.


                     We also reiterate our concern with the existing mechanism of
              land premium determination, as it has long been criticised that the said
              process has slowed down private development and redevelopment. This
              is especially the case when the “Pilot Scheme for Arbitration on Land
              Premium” which was introduced back in October 2014 has made a total of
              14 invitations, among which only one has undergone abitration, involving a
              total of $39.3 million. As argued in our first Research Report, we suggest the
              government to comprehensively review the said mechanism such that it
              can reflect the impact on development costs in response to latest changes
              in market situations and / or regulatory environment.


                     The approval mechanism aside, there are more structural issues
              at play. Firstly, whilst multiple government departments have their own
              spatial / geographical database about different aspects of the city, e.g.
              the Planning Department has one that oversees land uses; the Highways
              Department has one that supervises all roads; the Drainage Services
              Department’s is concerned with our drainage system, etc. Yet, these digital
              systems are not compatible with each other. As such, currently developers
              are submitting their development plans for approval in hard copies,
              whereas the government departments would comment on the physical
              scanned copies of the submission. We have analysed this issue in-depth in
              our Research Report on Innovation and Technology published in December
              2015. 4













              4.  Please see pages 99 to 111 of “The Ecosystem of Innovation and Technology in Hong Kong”, Our Hong Kong Foundation.
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