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The Financial Secretary, Mr Henry Tang, and members of the Commission on Poverty (the Commission) today (November 1) visited a restaurant inside a resident club house of a private housing estate in Tseung Kwan O. The restaurant is a social enterprise operated by the Neighbourhood Advice-Action Council (NAAC).
The NAAC operates all together nine social enterprise units, including the above restaurant, an one-stop household service, mobile car cleaning and laundry services. All these social enterprise units are operated on a self-financing basis.
Up till now, these social enterprise units have created 88 job opportunities (52 for people with disabilities and 36 for able-bodied people), providing 450 job training opportunities a year in a real-world work environment.
Mr Tang, who is the chairman of the Commission, said, ˇ§It is encouraging to see the achievements of the social enterprise today. It is a self-financing operation, engaging in partnership with the business sector on an equal footing to provide job training opportunities for the disadvantaged. It goes a long way towards enhancing the self-confidence and employability of the disadvantaged.ˇ¨
ˇ§Their high quality client-based service has gained the acceptance and trust of the business sector and the residents and contributes to fostering collaboration between people with disabilities and the community at large. I believe it provides a good role model for other organisations.ˇ¨
At an experience sharing session this afternoon, representatives of both residents and the estate management company expressed appreciation for the one-stop household service (including meals and beverages, home-delivery Chinese soup, household cleaning, pest control and car cleaning service) provided by the NAAC. They praised the employees for their good work attitude and performance. The representative of the estate management company pointed out that the business sector, by exchanging views on business operations and forming partnerships with social enterprises, was not only fulfilling its social responsibility but also providing the best support to the development of a caring community.
To facilitate a better understanding of development of social enterprises in Hong Kong, the Commission organised a lunch seminar for members of the relevant government advisory boards, government departments and the academia before the visit today. Scholars studying social enterprises and non-government organisations operating them were invited to share their views with the guests and discuss how they could make use of these enterprises to help the disadvantaged find jobs and become self-reliant. The guests attending the lunch seminar generally agreed that the seminar had enhanced their understanding of social enterprises and the benefits they could bring to the community.
At its previous meeting on September 12, the Commission agreed to further promote development of social enterprises to help the able-bodied unemployed move from welfare to self-reliance. Members also agreed that by studying the development of social enterprises and promoting this concept through different channels, it can help establish the value of social enterprises, enhance public support for them and provide real job opportunities the unemployed to become self-reliant. Todayˇ¦s visit and seminar are part of the activities organised by the Commission to promote the concept of social enterprises. The Commission will continue to work with the relevant parties in furthering the study and is planning to co-organise a forum with the Central Policy Unit early next year to encourage various parties to share their experience and explore ways to create a more favourable environment for development of social enterprises in Hong Kong.
Further information on social enterprises is available at the website of the Commission: www.cop.gov.hk.
Ends/Tuesday, November 1, 2005
Issued at HKT 19:19
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