Dear Fellow Oxfam Trailwalkers,

 

Oxfam Trailwalker 2017 Visit – Understanding Poverty in Sham Shui Po

low-income families who are waiting for public housing have to pay unreasonably high rent for tiny subdivided flats or cubicles. Oxfam’s partners have been raising awareness about this situation, and advocating for the provision of short-term and intermediate remedial measures for public housing applicants who have been waiting for years.

 

The effects of poverty are not just limited to housing though. Around the world, there are nearly 9 million undernourished people, but 30-50 per cent of food is wasted. In Hong Kong, the situation is no different. That is why many local NGOs and food banks now ‘rescue’ surplus food and redistribute them to the poor.

 

You are cordially invited to join the Oxfam Trailwalker 2017 Visit to learn more about these issues and how Oxfam and its partners are addressing them. Details are as follows:

 

Oxfam Trailwalker 2017 Visit – Understanding Poverty in Sham Shui Po

 

Date:                        5 May, 2018 (Saturday)

Time:                        5 – 9 pm

Destination:               Mongkok, Sham Shui Po and Shek Kip Mei (TBC for details)

Purpose:                    To visit underprivileged families who live in subdivided flats, and to collect and redistribute surplus vegetables to the elderly who live in poverty.

Fee:                           Free (excluding personal expenses, e.g. transportation)

No. of participants:     12 persons

Requirements:           All participants must have joined/sponsored/supported a team during at least one Oxfam Trailwalker in the past

Application:               Please download and fill in the reply form (see attachment), and return it to Oxfam Hong Kong by fax (2527 6213), email (otwinfo@oxfam.org.hk) or post (17/F, China United Centre, 28 Marble Road, North Point, HK) by 16 April, 2018. If more than 12 people register, we will select participants based on the number of times they have joined Oxfam Trailwalker and how they intend to share their trip experience. A confirmation letter will be sent to selected participants on or before 25 April, 2018.

Form: http://www.oxfamtrailwalker.org.hk/wp-content/uploads/2018/04/OTW2017-Visit-Reply-Slip-Eng.pdf

 

More information about Oxfam’s work in Hong Kong:

We at Oxfam Hong Kong have been concerned about local poverty since the 1970s, and implemented our first local project in 1996 to support local organisations through grants and other support. Over the years, we have been promoting pro-poor policies through policy research, advocacy campaigns, public education, and supporting local groups to implement various types of poverty alleviation programmes. We have been actively participating in local anti-poverty initiatives, from the formulation of the poverty line and implementation of minimum wage to the advocacy of a subsidy for low-income working families and scrapping of the MPF offsetting mechanism, as well as the promotion of initiatives to support young ethnic minority children to learn Chinese as a second language.

 

According to the Commission on Poverty’s latest statistics, even after policy intervention there are still 990,000 poor people living in Hong Kong and the poverty rate stands at 14.7 per cent. Nearly half of the poor live in working and poor families, reflecting the severity of problem of poverty in Hong Kong.

 

For more information, please visit: http://www.oxfam.org.hk/en/localpoverty.aspx