Announcement speech: The HKSF SHK/Scallywag Development Programme

Mr. Lee Seng Huang and Mr David Witt © HKSF

Welcome to the Hong Kong Sailing Federation reception. This is our moment, as the sailing community, to say thank you to all of those who have worked so hard to bring this great event to Hong Kong, to welcome our visitors, and to open our village properly.

First and foremost I must of course give enormous thanks to the Government of Hong Kong for their never ending support and detailed involvement in the planning of this event. Without the Government's assistance this simply would not have been possible.

But there are many others too:

• Our sponsors who have been so kind and generous,
• Our delivery partners, who have been so patient and persistent,
• Those that organise the race, who have been so helpful in building the village and promoting the stop-over.
• Our volunteers and community, who will bring the village alive with fun and atmosphere over the next 10 days.

I should also thank the sailors, who spend seven months of their lives on dried food and intolerable conditions, so that we can live vicariously on their adventures.

I am particularly excited to see that the Scallywags are living up to the Hong Kong tradition of capitalising on opportunity, and are currently winning the leg – lets hope that lasts for the next few days into Hong Kong.

Hong Kong is an amazing place. It has an iconic built environment that the world recognises instantly. But perhaps one of its best kept secrets is its beautiful natural environment. Approximately 75% of Hong Kong is open countryside. We have beautiful mountains, hiking trails through lush forests, and we are surrounded by ocean.

Sailing teaches us to respect and sustain that environment. At the same time it develops strong resilience, endurance and teamwork, amidst the natural environment that we so cherish.

We should be aiming to teach our all of our children to engage fully with the opportunities that sailing presents in this respect. To do that we need a programme of education and development aimed at a broad spectrum of society.

To that end I am delighted to announce the HKSF SHK/Scallywag Development Programme. It is a programme which, if fully funded, will provide 9,000 days of free education and sailing to less advantaged children from Hong Kong. That includes teaching them to swim if they if they have not had the luxury of learning to do so before.

It is designed to be a long term, and sustainable programme that will ultimately build a city of sailors who are environmentally aware and who can take the life skills they have learned as part of the programme back into the broader community.

We need to fund that programme. Sun Hung Kai, Mr Lee and the Scallywag programme, have generously promised a dollar for dollar match for every dollar we can raise. I hope that during the course of the next few days many of you will feel able to join the federation, and support this goal.

But meanwhile, I say thank you once again, to all those who have helped us arrive at this point. I hope that our stop-over meets, and exceeds, your expectations. It is a pleasure to see you all here tonight, and I wish you all a very pleasant evening.