Celebrating the Mid-Autumn Festival with purpose in Hong Kong 2021

We’re proud to be launching our ‘Celebrating with Purpose’ campaign for the third consecutive year, to mark the Mid-Autumn Festival with a purpose to make a positive impact for a better and more sustainable future. Guided by our global commitment to The UN Global Compact, our campaign this year will focus on reducing social inequality and addressing environmental impacts – which are two specific UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) that we’ve committed to. Read on to see how we’re turning our global ESG ambitions into real local initiatives.

Reducing inequality and promoting inclusiveness

In Hong Kong, around one-third of the elderly population is living under the poverty line¹. Separately, a lack of funding and public facilities for inclusiveness programmes means that children with Special Education Needs (SEN) face daily challenges to properly integrate into society.

In collaboration with our local charity St. James’ Settlement, we’re donating the money we’d normally use to buy mooncakes for clients to provide meals for 800 deprived elderly people, and rent a cinema house to provide private movie time for 40 families who have children with SEN. With these contributions, we hope to reduce inequalities within our community based on age, income and disability.

Every little effort counts to combat environmental issues

According to a local survey, around 2.9 million mooncakes went to waste in Hong Kong in 2019², with the uneaten treats ending up in landfills, causing environmental problems of food wastage. Through our campaign we’ve saved around 1,000 mooncakes this year, significantly reducing our business’s impact on the environment. We hope our actions will help raise concerns to the public on environment protection and bring the attention of our business network to tackle broader climate issues.

A better and more sustainable future

James Donnan, Regional Managing Director of Asia-Pacific, says: “Our employees shared with us that they want to work for a company that takes Environmental, Social, Governance (ESG) responsibilities seriously. Our Celebrating with Purpose campaign reflects how determined we are to break down our ESG strategy into our business operations and achieve the specific UN Sustainable Development Goals that we’ve committed to.”

Sarah Chao, Managing Director of Hong Kong, adds: “I am very excited about this campaign as ESG tops the business agenda for most organisations. Every little effort counts, and I hope we can step up our ESG efforts and influence our business stakeholders to build a better and sustainable future with us.”

If you want to find out more about St. James Settlement, please click here.

¹ https://www.povertyrelief.gov.hk/eng/pdf/Hong_Kong_Poverty_Situation_Report_2017(2018.11.19).pdf
² https://www.thestandard.com.hk/section-news/section/4/210729/No-saving-grace-in-mooncake-waste