Creative ideas to tackle social problems

With the theme "Tackling Poverty Problems with Social Innovation", the Social Innovation and Entrepreneurship Development Fund (SIE Fund) and Youth.gov.hk jointly organised the SI (Social Innovation) CEO Competition. The final pitching and the award presentation ceremony were held on 22nd April.

The competition aimed to enhance understanding of poverty relief, inspire innovative ideas and actions to tackle social and poverty problems, and nurture social entrepreneurship among students. Selecting from the sub-themes, namely, Care for Elderly, Food Support, and Social Inclusion, participating teams were asked to develop an innovative solution to social issue and formulate a business proposal.

A team of four undergraduate students, Valent Cheung Chiu-ying, BBA Global Business Systems Management, Francis Sze Chek-fai, BSc Computer Science, Michelle Kwok Yi-ling, BBA Marketing, and Leon Lee Ho-wai, BBA Global Business Systems Management, suggested a business proposal - ElderTreks (歲閱悠遊), in offering local tours which hire the elderly as guides and using mobile app to let participants explore genuine community culture in different dimensions. The competition attracted a total of 139 project proposals submitted by students from 26 tertiary institutions, and the CityU team was crowned championship.

Valent Cheung said, "Through recruiting the elderly to be the tour guides, we explore possibilities to foster the bonding of teenagers, minorities and the senior community in Hong Kong."

The group hoped that the project could acknowledge the valuable knowledge and qualities of the senior generation, as well as provide alternative employment opportunities to the retirees.

Apart from awarding the Champion Award, ElderTreks also received the Most Liked Award (live voting), Nomination Award, Most Social Innovative Award, and Social Inclusion Idea Distinction Award. One of the team members, Michelle Kwok, was presented the Most Valuable Presenter Award in the contest.

The winning team was awarded a start-up fund of HK$150,000 and a trip to the UK to visit overseas social innovation projects. The team will also receive corporation internship offers, CEO guidance and professional advisory services for idea implementation in the coming future.