Agriculture in Hong Kong - History

History

In the Colonial Hong Kong era around 1850s, agriculture in Hong Kong consisted mostly of revenue farms that focused on opium productions. The industry led to many wealthy Chinese businessmen, who established themselves as the middlemen merchants with international connection. Some of the successful farmers included Yan Wo Hong and Wo Hang Hong from 1858 to 1887. The system was discontinued by colonial authorities, when the economy needed to diversify in other activities. The last opium farm ended in 1913. One of the farm founded in the era include Hong Kong Dairy Farm in 1886. As Hong Kong government favor the transition into a secondary sector, and eventually a tertiary sector, agriculture became a reduced segment.

Organic Farming was introduced in 1988. An Accredited Farm Scheme for protecting the environment and consumers against residues of agricultural pesticides was introduced in 1994. Accredited farms strictly monitor and supervise the uses of pesticides, and produce are further analyzed for chemical remnants before they are sold at accredited retail outlets. In 1994 the agriculture and fisheries industry represented 2.7% of the work force and just a mere 0.2% of the total GDP.

Read more about this topic:  Agriculture In Hong Kong

Famous quotes containing the word history:

    The thing that struck me forcefully was the feeling of great age about the place. Standing on that old parade ground, which is now a cricket field, I could feel the dead generations crowding me. Here was the oldest settlement of freedmen in the Western world, no doubt. Men who had thrown off the bands of slavery by their own courage and ingenuity. The courage and daring of the Maroons strike like a purple beam across the history of Jamaica.
    Zora Neale Hurston (1891–1960)

    ... all big changes in human history have been arrived at slowly and through many compromises.
    Eleanor Roosevelt (1884–1962)

    Let us not underrate the value of a fact; it will one day flower in a truth. It is astonishing how few facts of importance are added in a century to the natural history of any animal. The natural history of man himself is still being gradually written.
    Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)