In 2015, OUHK has established of the Institute for Research in Innovative Technology and Sustainability (IRITS) for identifying suitable areas in environmental science for further development. Given the alignment between current need of coastal wetland conservation in the Greater Bay Area (GBA), the University would like to take the excellent accomplishment of the IRITS forward to the field of coastal wetland research.
With the funding support by the Institutional Development Scheme (IDS) Research Infrastructure Grant (Ref. No. UGC/IDS(R)16/19) from the Research Grant Council, The University has established the University Research Facilities in Basic and Applied Coastal Wetland Research Laboratory in Guandong-Hong Kong-Macau Greater Bay Area (URF) in 2020. The URF and the University will contribute to coastal wetland conservation and research and to Hong Kong’s efforts in meeting the developmental need of the GBA.
The URF has acquired some state-of-art research instruments and combining with existing research instruments to support members of IRITS to conduct world-class coastal wetland research. As one of the aims of URF is to promote collaborative research with partners in the GBA, the URF is also opened to scientists from other institutions. Non-local collaborative partners can also access to the instruments of the URF through their local collaborative partners.