Our Stories

Building a better future for children

Many of our colleagues have been long-term supporters of the Cambodian Children's Fund(CCF), a nonprofit organization that transforms Cambodia's most impoverished kids into tomorrow's leaders in Phnom Penh. After personally getting to know the work of the Cambodian Children's Fund, one of our senior leaders, Eric Leddel, galvanized other senior leaders and colleagues in the company to go on a 3-day volunteering trip to share skills and find ways build sustainable impact with CCF. Since then, Eric's passion has inspired others to get involved with CCF, with colleagues collaborating with CCF to develop a leadership curriculum and organizing workshops on design thinking, public speaking and leadership, and even prompting vendors to donate much-needed in-kind goods such as children’s clothing and studying materials to the organization.

Cleaning up our world

At Li & Fung, we encourage colleagues to build awareness of environmental issues and to take action to care for our environment. Since 2013, our global Clean Up Our World campaign aims to raise awareness, improve the environment and clean up their communities, including beaches, waterways, shorelines, parks, trails, mountains, and cities.

We also introduced our RETHINK Challenge, a campaign that brings together our colleagues, family, friends and members of the public to challenge themselves by avoiding  single-use and disposable containers for 1 week. As a result, people from over 24 countries and regions pledged to ditch single-use and disposable plastics and opt for more sustainable alternatives. The campaign turned out to be a very  educational experience, encouraging everyone to RETHINK  by developing more sustainable daily habits that would continue long after the challenge.

One participant from the UK commented, "I have become more aware of how much waste I create and how much I can avoid!" Last year, we challenged our colleagues to participate in Hong Kong’s first ever “No Single-Use Plastic Day” on May 30, a HK-wide public campaign launched by EcoDrive and Hong Kong New Youth Energy Think Tank, challenging everyone to avoid using single-use plastics for 1 day. Through this challenge, over 300 colleagues from Hong Kong and around the world pledged to stop using single-use plastics and opt for more sustainable alternatives for one day. Although this was a Hong Kong-based campaign, our global colleagues from China, India, Korea, Malaysia, Indonesia, Cambodia, Vietnam, Thailand, New York, Guatemala and Italy were excited to join in on this group effort and posted photos to show us what sustainable actions they have taken on this day.

Recycling soap, saving lives

Hotels across Asia dispose millions of soap bars each day, while children in the developing world die from largely preventable diseases, many of which could be drastically reduced through the simple practice of hand-washing. In our biggest team volunteering activity to date, more than 150 colleagues spent an afternoon with Soap Cycling (a Hong Kong non-profit dedicated to recycling previously used soap from hotels and redistributing it to those who need it most), to clean a whopping 350kg of soap, enough to supply 800 kids in the Philippines for a whole year. Our relationship with Soap Cycling has continued, and 500+ colleagues across Hong Kong and Mainland China have volunteered over 1,200 hours since 2016.

Distributing winter clothing

For the past six years, our colleagues in Bangladesh visited Gaibandha, one of the coldest regions in Bangladesh, to distribute winter clothes to low income families in the community. With the help of local NGO the SKS Foundation, every year LF colleagues travel more than 288 kilometers to support 2 rural villages in the community, providing warm clothes and blankets to 3,000 community members.

For the eight consecutive year, our colleagues in Bangladesh participated in the Warm Cloth Distribution Program to distribute winter clothes and blankets to low income families in the coldest regions in Bangladesh. With the help of a renowned local NGO, Eco Social Development Organisation (ESDO), our colleagues identified new disadvantaged communities in need of winter clothing this year – Thakurgaon, Dinajpur and Panchagarh in the northern part of Bangladesh situated 412 km away from Dhaka. Our colleagues visited these 3 rural villages over two days and provided winter necessities enough to last for at least 3 to 5 winters to 1,000 families.

Raising awareness for women’s health

Li & Fung has been a long-term supporter of women’s health awareness. Our colleagues promote the importance of regular checkups for early detection and the adoption of healthy lifestyle habits to help decrease the risk of disease.

Every October, colleagues participate in Women’s Health Awareness Month by raising awareness and funds through seminars, checkups, information sharing and our global Dress Pink Day. In some markets, workers, corporate partners and friends and families join us.  

Following Women’s Health Awareness Month, colleagues participate in Men’s Health Awareness Month every November to raise awareness and funds through information sharing, growing moustaches and more.

Empowering girls to reach their potential

In Qinghai China, nomadic tribal beliefs are deep-rooted and being born a girl is widely considered to be penance for wrongdoings in a previous life. Many girls are orphaned or abandoned and end up in poor conditions where they are badly treated. Even though education is available for many of them it is not a realistic option.

Over US$272,560 has been raised by Li & Fung colleagues, including matching from the Foundation, to support a brighter future for girls at the Seng Girls Vocational Training School.