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It is often said that "where there is a will, there is a way", but when faced with an ambitious goal like sustainable development, where can ordinary citizens and business leaders start? Link believes that the only way to achieve this goal is by connecting stakeholders from different sectors of the community, working together with those who share the same vision. To this end, Link Sustainability Lab actively seeks out like-minded partners to promote cross-sector collaboration and develop actionable pathways for communities and enterprises to adopt sustainable lifestyles and business models.
Four of the Lab’s collaboration partners from different sectors share their sustainability goals, challenges, and how they think sustainability knowledge and practices should be promoted more effectively to people and enterprises.
Food Angel is a long-term partner of Link for over seven years, and an avid promoter of food waste recycling and the culture of cherishing food. Heather Tse, Project Manager of Food Angel, thinks that the biggest challenge in popularising the culture is the lack of motivation for people to change.
"In our experience, empathy is a very important part of the equation. We designed the ‘VR Theatre: Double lives of Carrots' workshop to allow participants to immerse into the role of food characters in a first-person point-of-view, as if experiencing the different fates of food themselves. Combined with scenes captured in real life, the VR experience makes it easier for children and parents to understand the consequences of the different choices they make. One small step at a time, they became more and more willing to make a promise to cherish food."
Despite the good story paired with exciting technology quickly proved to be a winning formula for a crowd favourite, Heather believes that they should not stop there, as a good message requires a great channel to be spread further. “A platform like Link Sustainability Lab allows us to reach not only the residents of Lok Fu, where the Lab is located, but also citizens from all over the city.” She hopes to continue this workshop in the future and collaborate with schools to reach more students through the Lab. so that they can learn about the value of food from a young age and have a grateful heart towards food.
Link has partnered with CLP and sustainable food consultancy Grassroots Initiatives to curate the "Sustainable Cha Chaan Teng" showroom, with the aim to demonstrate how even the most traditional style of operation in the catering industry can transition into a sustainable one by making multiple small changes, while meeting the tastes and demands of the new generation.
Peggy Chan, Principal Consultant of Grassroots Initiatives believes that simply focusing on raising public awareness of sustainable development from the consumer end is not enough. Peggy has been working in the food-service industry for over 20 years and is a pioneer in advocating for low-carbon whole plant foods within the industry. She has observed that the industry as a whole still lacks a sense of urgency and willingness to act towards sustainable development, resulting in a significant gap between the industry and the goal. She later founded Grassroots Initiatives to equip businesses with the know-how to transit to and adopt best sustainable practices.
“Collaboration requires involvement by all sectors including the government and private organisations to fundamentally redesign the food economy.” Citing an example, Peggy shared that the lack of transparency in the food value chain actually has easily implementable solutions, such as proactively requesting specification sheets or certifications from producers and suppliers, while encouraging them to meet best practices.
“If food operators build connections with their producers and suppliers more directly, many questions can actually be answered. For producers and suppliers in general, the more that human and planetary health goals are integrated with their financial goals, the more willing they are to share information about their processes with you. Ultimately, real sustainability is only achieved when we do it together.”
Peggy believes that Link Sustainability Lab is a good starting point for launching a sustainable journey that is meaningful and impactful for the local community, especially since most of Link’s shopping centre tenants are local small-to-medium-sized food and restaurant businesses, which are exactly where a lot of the transfer of knowledge and cultural shifts need to happen in order to generate real impact.
In July, Grassroots Initiatives will be hosting a tailored workshop on sustainable operations for food and beverage operators at the Link Sustainability Lab. Peggy hopes to continue providing training, consulting services, and encouraging more restaurants to join Zero Foodprint Asia’s 1% pledge programme.
Lena Low, Senior Director of Customer Success and Experience at CLP, shared that in recent years, sustainable operations have become an important consideration for every company that wants to achieve long-term business development. Therefore, CLP offers a suite of energy services and solutions, such as free energy audit services, to support customers, including small and medium-sized enterprises, to meet their energy management needs, make better energy choices, and find solutions to achieve their sustainability goals, ultimately benefiting the community and the environment.
"We are pleased to collaborate with Link to set up a fully electric kitchen inside the ‘Sustainable Cha Chaan Teng’ at Link Sustainability Lab to showcase the benefits of electric cooking. The cooperation between CLP and Link enables us to add value to Link's tenants and inspire more businesses to become aware of their energy consumption, adopt energy saving practices and do our part in supporting sustainability and ESG. We look forward to more collaboration opportunities with Link and support customers who have the same needs to become more sustainable."
CLP also supports the Link Tenant Academy by sharing the latest energy-saving information to Link's tenants and providing useful data via Smart Energy Online system to improve energy efficiency and reduce operating costs.
Buying local ingredients is one way to practice low-carbon living and eco-friendly catering. In collaboration with the Agriculture, Fisheries and Conservation Department (AFCD), Link produced a documentary on local sustainable fisheries, screened inside the Link Sustainability Lab theatre to provide the public with a better understanding of the topic.
Dr Peter Luk, Fisheries Officer (Aquaculture Projects) of the AFCD shared that the proportion of sustainable fish catch has been declining over the past 50 years, but with high per capita demand for aquatic products in Hong Kong, the development of local aquaculture has become increasingly important. However, public education and promotion have yet to be strengthened.
"As a result of overfishing, some local seafood that used to be widely available, such as the Hong Kong Grouper, has become very rare. The taste, size and availability of some common seafood ingredients have also deteriorated significantly.”
Although local fish farms are supported by government policies, Peter believes that to sustain the development of local fisheries and to promote it to the wider public, there is a need to support fish stalls to promote and sell locally farmed fish.
"In fact, there are many practical benefits of farming in local fish farms. For example, the aquaculture environment, food safety and even mud taste will be examined before sold. However, these concepts have not been popularised. Since most people are most likely to come across fish in the market, and Link has a sizable fresh market business, a place like Lok Fu Market would provide an ideal platform ‘around the block’ for the public to learn about local fish.”
Peter hopes the Link Sustainability Lab can connect different stakeholders, including representatives of the catering industry and fishermen, as well as the public, so that the commercial and sustainability value of local fish farming can be promoted more widely, ultimately developing a "local fish" value chain, one where the public can benefit from and fishermen can be proud being a part of.
Link's Managing Director of Corporate Affairs, Lorraine Chan encourages individuals and groups from different sectors in society to participate and take advantage of this collaborative platform. "The purpose of curating Link Sustainability Lab is to promote the public and businesses’ understanding that sustainable development is a part of everyday life, actionable and achievable by anyone. Whether it's our shoppers, tenants, suppliers, business partners, industry peers, or community organisations, we hope this space can be an ideal platform for you to learn and explore sustainable development practices."
