Sustainable development in the housing will significantly contribute to the development of sustainable communities across the country. The professional housing managers are committed to mainstreaming sustainability principles into both its own operations and activities. The environmental sustainability, economic sustainability, social sustainability and cultural sustainability are the development sustainable Indicators In Hong Gong’s housing system.
Environmental Sustainability of Housing Environmental sustainability Is the process of making sure current processes of Interaction with the environment are pursued with the Idea of keeping the environment as pristine as naturally possible based on Ideal-seeking behavior. The professional housing mangers should concern the resident’s living environment on energy efficient amenities, which better serve their residents.
Furthermore, they are committed to help improve resident living environmental performance by: complying with relevant environmental protection ordinances promoting waste reduction, recovery and recycling and consumption of resources minimizing the production of environmental pollutants developing a culture of environmental protection and awareness among their residents promoting and ensuring building safety and timely maintenance In our organization, we aim to provide a green environment in workplace and to ensure that our operation is conducted in an environmentally conscious and responsible manner.
The main objectives are to reduce paper and energy consumption. In working towards better and healthier future, we strive to protect and conserve the environment through: adopting green housekeeping measures in daily operations with a view to maintaining a green workplace encouraging staff participation in environmental protection activities In order to provide a health and sustainable environmental for our residents, we are allowing the principles of “Reduce, Re-use and Recycle” to minimize materials and energy consumption.
Major measures include: potable water consumption The timers have been adjusted to shorten the operating hours of the air conditioning systems and lighting system for our shopping centers in order to reduce energy consumption Conduct programmer on source of separate waste Green Boxes are placed in various convenient locations for collection of wastes paper for recycling Economic sustainability of Housing Economic sustainability is not Just about achieving economic growth year on year.
It’s bout understanding that economic growth is only sustainable if it simultaneously improves our quality of life and the environment. Applying the concept to housing, there are two pre-requisites for housing to be economically sustainable. First, the benefits to housing providers and produces must a least be equal to the costs of housing production given the housing demand levels. It also pertains to the ability of housing consumers to afford an acceptable quality of housing.
The second is the identification of the environmental gains and cost of housing activities and others, the avoidance of long-term adverse impact on the sustainability of the natural environment. Improved construction quality translates into greater sustainability of community, which can lower future maintenance costs and more sustainable living environment for our residents. Therefore, the professional housing managers should make the best use of suitable building materials, effective tender practices as well as timely contract management and associated monitoring initiatives.
To ensure the continuing quality and cost-effectiveness of facilities for our residents, timely checking and maintenance to the facilities are arranged in order to ensure it functional. To integrate our expertise with the contractors, we have setup ranking system to the performance of our contractor. Score on the field of (1) Timing/ Accuracy, (2) Work Quality/Workmanship, (3) Work Attitude/Cooperative should be given to each Job upon completion inspection.
The score should be recorded onto our contractor list for periodic view. Social sustainability of Housing There are more diverse views on the concept of social sustainability. The first interpretation to the need to change attitude and values if ecological sustainability is to be sought, the second interpretation to the environment-focus and the people- coco, the third interpretation to combined to form a more comprehensive concept of social sustainability. These three interpretations also apply to housing.
The social dimension of sustainable housing pertains to: a) The social preconditions conducive to the production and consumption of environmentally sustainable housing: It involves values, habits, rules and life style environmentally consciousness, regulations and includes reductions in energy consumption, optimal use of green design and measures in-built to the building. B) Equitable distribution and consumption of housing resources and assets This aspect pertains to housing equity and housing standards, affordability, role of the government in housing and housing subsidy policies. ) Harmonious social relations within the housing system This aspect is concerned with the landlord and tenant relationships, the relationship between the have and the have-onto. The major concerns are to resolve conflicts of interests and the building up of social capital in the housing area. D) An acceptable quality of housing and living environment Refer to the internal housing conditions and immediate living environment: (I)lanterns housing conditions includes adequacy of housing space, degree of sharing ND self-containment, ventilation and natural lighting. Ii)External residential quality include cleanliness in the neighborhood, access to open space, access to community facilities, noise level For the role of professional housing managers, safety in their managed estates is the major focus of social programmer. Safety has always been a priority for staffs, contractors, and residents in daily operation. They should provide a training to their staff to avoid injury to themselves and do not tolerate unsafe work practices. Keeping tighten monitoring of their contractors can be improved hygiene and the health of our residents’ living environment.
In our organization, we encourage the involvement of residents in safety awareness activities and also give recognition to us for safety accomplishments, such as providing general safety training to staff and provide subsidies for us to pursue continuing professional education outside of office hours. Furthermore, we would periodic review and set-up improvement programmer to provide safety facilities for our residents, such as using more energy efficient lighting to common area and replace gallivanted iron fresh water pipes with non-ferrous pipes in our fresh water supply system to keep water quality.
Cultural sustainability of housing Culture sustainability covers three major dimensions. The first is its aesthetic and artistic dimension. This covers fine arts, music, popular culture, performing arts, and other. The second aspect refers to the cultivation of mind and spirit. It includes knowledge, belief, religion and ideologies. The third dimension is the anthropological perspective: the way of life; and it pertains to the social aspect of human behavior. It is totality of the socio-cultural convention inherent in a specific society.
It includes orals, values, laws, codes, customs, traditions, heritage, life styles and the ways we identity to a place over different time periods. A distinctive feature of cultural sustainability is nonetheless the preservation of housing heritage. Housing has a physical form and the form reflects how inhabitants adapt to the natural habitat. The physical form of housing is not only a reflection of but also a component of culture itself. Housing forms reflects the many and varied environment-man relationships and the interactions between man and nature.
Different stages of housing denote the change of a culture and the culture identity of a place. For the idea of sustainable living to permeate the community, the greatest challenge is in instilling a culture of green living in estates. The professional housing managers should introduce education campaigns and outreach programmer to promote concepts of ‘greener’ living, such as reducing and sorting waste for recycling, promoting energy and water saving schemes and avoiding estate hygiene problems.
To create a culture of commitment among our residents and us, we have regular meeting with owner’s committee, which can keeps informed of many activities and major developments in our estate. Moreover, we conduct various surveys to gauge our resident’s view on estate management such as customer satisfaction surveys and other ad-hoc surveys. With strengthen awareness of our residents in protection environment, we have launched with Friends of the Earth (HACK) to promote the collection of moon-cake boxes for recycling.
Large collection bins were placed in our common area for our residents to drop in their unwanted moon-cake boxes. Programmer on source of separate waste will be further encouraged to our cleaning contractor in order to help reduce the waste being disposal of at landfill site. Conclusion Sustainable development principles and approaches should be integrated into leslies, strategies and planning processes. Protecting environment is a fundamental aspect of sustainability development.
However, environment good practice still requires a lot of work. A good environment performance is important to mitigate the impact of climate change, which is greatest problem facing in the world. However, the sitting of houses, the materials of which they are made, and the uses the occupants make of such resources as energy and water, all have major environmental implications. The professional housing mangers should have the potential to make a significant contribution to an improved environment.
