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The Secretary for Commerce and Economic Development, Mr Gregory So, today (November 17) congratulated the awardees of the Hong Kong Young Design Talent Award (YDTA) 2014 on their outstanding achievements and pledged continued commitment to promote and support the local design sector through various initiatives.
The annual YDTA recognises up-and-coming practising designers and design graduates with sponsorship from the Government and other parties to undertake overseas training.
"In the eight years since the YDTA was launched in 2005, a total of 50 practising designers and design graduates have been awarded with sponsorship for overseas training under the programme, of whom 24 were sponsored by the Government. Thirty-eight of them have already completed their overseas training and they all responded with very positive feedback," Mr So said.
"In view of the encouraging results, the Government has decided to increase the number of sponsorships from four to 12 this year to demonstrate its commitment in nurturing local design talents.
"We hope that through opportunities to undergo overseas work attachments or studies, our young design talents would be able to widen their exposure and connect with the most up-to-date design trends in the world," he said.
The 12 awardees to be sponsored by the Government for overseas training this year include the five awardees of the CreateSmart Young Design Talent Award who will receive $500,000 sponsorship each and seven awardees of the CreateSmart Young Design Talent Special Award who will receive $250,000 sponsorship each.
These sponsorships are provided by the Create Hong Kong (CreateHK) office of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region Government under the CreateSmart Initiative (CSI). CreateHK also provides funding support to the Design Incubation Programme (DIP) to assist design start-ups. As at end-September 2014, the DIP had admitted over 160 incubatees over the past eight years, with 102 of them having completed the incubation programme.
"I am pleased to learn that some of these graduated incubatees have continued their businesses at PMQ, which is another initiative by the Government to promote the local design sector by converting a historical site in Central into a creative industry landmark with a focus on design," Mr So said.
The YDTA, organised by the Hong Kong Design Centre, aims to broaden the horizons and deepen the design knowledge of Hong Kong's young designers in pursuit of their creative careers. Apart from the CSI sponsorship, the School of Design of the Hong Kong Polytechnic University and the Hong Kong Design Institute also provide sponsorship for two awardees to undergo overseas work attachment or studies.
The award presentation ceremony of the YDTA 2014 is scheduled to be held on December 3. More details of the YDTA are available at www.ydta.hk.
Ends/Monday, November 17, 2014
Issued at HKT 14:34
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