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The Food Wise Hong Kong (FWHK) Campaign was today (October 24) awarded Excellence Award at the HKMA/TVB Awards for Marketing Excellence 2014 in recognition of the campaign's success in taking root in the community and promoting a "food wise" culture in Hong Kong.
"The FWHK Campaign, being the first Government promotional campaign to receive the award, will continue to organise various educational and promotional activities to publicise the message of food waste reduction in the community," a spokesman for the Environmental Protection Department said.
Launched in May last year, the FWHK Campaign aims to promote a "food wise" culture and encourage behavioural changes to reduce food waste in various sectors through different schemes and activities, such as the Food Wise Charter and FWHK Ambassador Scheme. To date over 370 organisations have signed the Food Wise Charter and are committed to reducing food waste in their daily operations, while about 1 300 FWHK Ambassadors have taken part in the food waste reduction training workshops to prepare themselves for the promotion of Food Wise message at the district level.
Some Food Wise Charter signing organisations have already achieved encouraging results in food waste reduction. Among them, the MTR has launched an incentive scheme which has successfully encouraged their food and beverage tenants to reduce food waste generation by 15 per cent in 18 months, while a well-known hotel has achieved the reduction of food waste by 20 per cent in a year.
Food donation, with the dual goals of caring for the needy and waste reduction, is another important element in the FWHK campaign. The Government supports food donation projects run by non-governmental organisations (NGOs) through the Environment and Conservation Fund (ECF). Up to now, the ECF has approved a total fund of more than $10 million to subsidise NGOs in implementing food donation projects. It is estimated that more than 900 tonnes of surplus food will be collected for redistribution to some 500 000 recipients through these projects.
Big Waster is a character symbolising food wastage in the FWHK Campaign. A Facebook page for Big Waster has also been launched to enhance interaction with Big Waster fans and provide up-to-date messages on food waste reduction. Members of the public are encouraged to "like" the Facebook page to show their support for food waste reduction.
For more details of the FWHK Campaign, please visit the thematic website at www.foodwisehk.gov.hk and Big Waster's Facebook page: www.facebook.com/bigwaster.hk (Chinese only).
Ends/Friday, October 24, 2014
Issued at HKT 22:30
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