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DHL-SCMP Hong Kong Business Awards
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Philanthropists, champions of social responsibility lead 2020 honours list in DHL-SCMP Hong Kong Business Awards

  • Tan Siu-lin, founder of the Luen Thai Group of companies and one of Hong Kong’s best-known philanthropists, topped the 2020 honours list
  • New World Development’s Adrian Cheng received the Business Person of the Year Award, while Chow Tai Fook Jewellery’s Kent Wong received the Enterprise Award

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A collage of the winners of the 2020 DHL-SCMP Hong Kong Business Awards. Clockwise from top centre: Adrian Cheng Chi-kong (New World Development), Winfried Engelbrecht-Bresges (The Hong Kong Jockey Club), Billy Yeung (HKBN), Tan Siu-lin (Luen Thai Group), Dr Derek Baram (Central Smile), Jack Zhang (Airwallex), Kent Wong (Chow Tai Fook Jewellery). Photo: SCMP
SCMP Reporter

Tan Siu-lin, founder of the Luen Thai Group of company and one of Hong Kong’s best-known philanthropists, has been honoured for a lifetime of contributions to industry and his charitable donations by the city’s oldest and most prestigious business awards.

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Tan, 89, received the Lifetime Achievement Award at the top of the honours list in the 2020 DHL-SCMP Hong Kong Business Awards, the 31st year that the accolades were given to the city’s captains of industry. Adrian Cheng Chi-kong, the chief executive and executive vice-chairman of New World Development, received the Business Person of the Year award.
The awards came in a year of unprecedented contraction in Hong Kong’s economy, as the coronavirus pandemic followed last year’s anti-government protests and almost two years of the US-China trade war. Amid slumping corporate earnings and record unemployment in a recession, the awards’ panel of judges - including winners of the previous year - shifted the weight of their adjudication to emphasise corporate social responsibility, from the usual financial indicators, in recognition of businesses that have gone the extra mile to care for their staff or give back to society amid hard times.

“These champions have gone beyond conventional business goals to uplift staff and stakeholders, and to address the fault lines exposed by the challenging environment, so we celebrate these exemplary citizens for leveraging their businesses to serve community needs and give back to society during the recession,” said Gary Liu, chief executive of South China Morning Post, one of the award’s two organisers. “They have put on display the tenacity, grit and innovation that defines Hong Kong, and time and again helped this city turn crisis into opportunity.”

Source: Hong Kong Census and Statistics Department, SCMP Graphics
Source: Hong Kong Census and Statistics Department, SCMP Graphics
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The Lifetime Achievement Award is a discretionary honour that is given only to exceptional nominees through unanimous acclamation, unlike the other award categories that are decided by simple majority in voting. Previous Lifetime Achievement honours were awarded to Victor Fung of the Fung Group in 2019, Lee Man Tat of the Lee Kam Kee Group in 2018, L.T. Lam of Forward Winsome Industries in 2017 and James Thompson of Crown Worldwide in 2014.

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