PRESS RELEASES
Donation programme during the festive season invites hotel guests to contribute to the cause
December 16, 2021
Rosewood Hong Kong has partnered with ImpactHK, a local non-profit group dedicated to providing meals and shelter to the homeless as well as solutions to enable them to develop and sustain independent livelihoods. Rosewood’s multi-tiered, year-long engagement addresses the charity group’s three key areas of need: finances, food and job training. It includes meal donations, skill-building for future employment and a donation programme at the height of the festive season, opening the door for hotel guests to give back to their community in the holiday spirit of helping others less fortunate.
“We’re acutely aware of the challenges faced by our grassroots community amid a time of hardship compounded by the COVID-19 pandemic,” says Hoss Vetry, Regional Vice President and Managing Director of Rosewood Hong Kong. “Our partnership with ImpactHK will help transform lives and sow dignity amongst an underserved population who simply need a helping hand and a pathway to become self-supporting.”
The Kind Kitchen
ImpactHK’s newly conceived Kind Kitchen in Tai Kok Tsui employs formerly homeless individuals and provides safe and stable housing for them as well as on-the-job training to prepare them for work in the food and beverage and other customer service industries. Starting in 2022, Rosewood will sponsor a full-time Kind Kitchen staff trainee for an entire year. As well, Rosewood Hong Kong’s senior chef and regional director of culinary operations, Fabian Altabert, along with his top-notch culinary team, will provide basic kitchen and cooking skills workshops every two months for the Kind Kitchen food and beverage staff.
“Giving Holidays”: Fund-raising at Rosewood Hong Kong
From 20 to 31 December 2021, Rosewood Hong Kong will support ImpactHK by donating HKD1.00 per guest dining at any of our seven restaurants during the busy festive season. In addition, other guests can also support ImpactHK by purchasing the “Joy”, “Fortune”, and “Harvest” Chinese New Year festive hampers. In the spirit of giving, for every hamper purchase, Rosewood will donate 5% of the proceeds of the hampers to this good cause. Both initiatives raise funds to support ImpactHK’s array of programmes to aid those experiencing homelessness in Hong Kong.
“Rosewood Delivers”
Rosewood also launches Rosewood Delivers starting January 2022, an initiative in which 3,600 meal boxes for the entire year will be provided on a bi-weekly basis to those in need through ImpactHK. The meals will be cooked and prepared at Rosewood Hong Kong’s kitchen by the culinary operations team and staff volunteers.
“Multi-faceted partnerships with caring community leaders like Rosewood Hong Kong are key to escalating our efforts and capacity to make a difference,” says Jeff Rotmeyer, ImpactHK founder. “By joining hands, we can not only help fulfill the immediate safety and survival needs of those who are homeless, but give them hope for a brighter future with practical routes to achieve sustainably self-reliant lives.”
Homelessness in Hong Kong
Since 2019 there has been an almost 20% increase in the number of people experiencing homelessness in Hong Kong. However, non-profit organisations serving this community believe that the real number is far higher. Roots of the problem include lack of affordable housing and an average wait time for public rental housing of up to 5-6 years, for single males, the wait time is three to four times longer. Exacerbating the problem is unemployment, fuelled by the pandemic, which reached a 15-year-high in 2020.
