The first-ever Taiwan Excellence: “Sharing is Caring” campaign launched by Taiwan’s Bureau of Foreign Trade (BOFT), Ministry of Economic Affairs, recently announced the three winning campaigns. The top proposals were selected after a careful consideration of 781 submissions received from 61 countries.
The three winners, Marareia Hamilton from New Zealand, Jonathan J. Cartilla from the Philippines, and Danielle Chen from Taiwan, each received a US$150,000 grant for their award-winning community projects and a US$10,000 cash award.
Cynthia Kiang, Director General of BOFT, virtually presented certificates to the winners during an awards ceremony on January 26, 2022. She highlighted her excitement on how so much could be achieved and the many people that participated in its inaugural program launch, “We could feel that love and care are everywhere in the world.”
The “Sharing is Caring” program, launched in September 2021, provides social innovators and changemakers a platform to execute their ideas that focus on their home countries to aid their local environments and communities utilizing Taiwan Excellence products and services. The themes for the program are Social Concerns, Environmental Protection, and Corporate Governance.
Details on the award-winning campaigns:
Solar Solutions for Indigenous Māori Communities (New Zealand): Marareia Hamilton (and team), who has long been devoted to the development of Māori communities, proposed installing solar panels from Taiwan to build a self-sustaining green energy power-generation system within these communities that are often located in remote areas and where power supply might be inconsistent due to grid stability issues.
Educating and Empowering the Community through Mobile Kart (Philippines): Jonathan J. Cartilla’s proposal narrows the education divide between remote villages and cities while enhancing environmental protection. The mobile classroom – a cart powered by solar panels and equipped with laptops and internet – brings the classroom to children in remote areas and helps them learn how to use computers.
“One-day Medical Tour and Same-day Denture Delivery – Mobile Digital Denture Clinic & Oral Health Service Project” (Taiwan): Danielle Chen’s proposal focused on care for the health and well-being of the elderly in rural areas with a mobile medical vehicle equipped with dental care devices for measuring biodata. She stated that the quality of their healthcare services is guaranteed by using Taiwan Excellence award-winning products while being mobile brings the goodwill of Taiwan Excellence to some of the farthest remote corners of Taiwan.
“Sharing is Caring” is the first global cross-year, large-scale, corporate social responsibility charity event organized by Taiwan Excellence, an awards program celebrating and promoting top Taiwanese companies and products around the world, created by the Ministry of Economic Affairs (MOEA) and Taiwan External Trade Development Council (TAITRA). The inaugural program was sponsored by 29 Taiwan Excellence enterprises ranging from Taiwan’s well-known listed companies to small and medium-sized businesses.