A Tribute to Edwin Lau’s 36-year Environmental Journey

Chris has 20 years of experience working on large-scale business events. Originally from the UK, Chris has lived and worked in Hong Kong since 2015. Chris moved to Hong Kong to establish a North Asia office for a London-based trade expo organiser and launch a series of digital transformation events. The challenges of living sustainably and a developing concern around the exponential threats of the global climate emergency compelled Chris to “rethink” his own personal contribution to Hong Kong and how he could best make a positive impact on a city he now proudly calls home.

Chris conceived, designed and launched the ReThink HK event during the first part of 2019 – undeterred by the challenges faced by live events at that time, due to civil unrest, the new event concept for uniting the full business and sustainability ecosystem, championing positive action and shared responsibility received excellent support. The inaugural 2020 event was, unsurprisingly, delayed due to COVID but finally ran, in-person, at the K11 Quarry Bay with 450 attendees and all delegate fees were donated to local charities.

Chris’ experience in hosting content-led expo-style healthcare events in the UK, where partnerships and collaboration were crucial to scale and success, provided the foundation for Chris to widen the supporting-network of organisations and sponsors for ReThink HK. The event was moved to the HKCEC for the 2021 edition and resulted in Hong Kong’s best attended event dedicated to the business of sustainability, with over 2,200 attendees. Chris is proud to have maintained the event’s impact pledge; with all delegate fees contributing to impact projects with local Hong Kong charities.

Working alongside the Business Environment Council, Consulates and trade promotion offices, Chambers of Commerce, specialist industry associations, NGOs and action groups the collective ambition for ReThink HK is to accelerate change in Hong Kong – the event returns for its fourth edition this September at the HKCEC, will host over 6,000 attendees and aims to be at least carbon neutral.

All proceeds from delegate fees will be redirected to the newly incorporated Rethink Foundation, a not-for-profit focussed on helping registered NGOs build capacity and operate more sustainably.

Chris received a Bachelor’s degree in International Business and Italian from the University of Plymouth (UK). Chris is a member of the British Chamber of Commerce’s Social Sustainability Committee, sits on the Executive Committee and the Sustainability sub-committee of the Hong Kong Exhibition & Convention Industry Association.

My Sustainability Goals for 2025:

• Greater action from businesses to contribute towards a more sustainable HK
• Encourage other event organisers to commit to sustainable solutions
• Demonstrate that businesses can be operated profitably and with purpose

Mr Edwin Lau is the Founder of The Green Earth, an environmental organization promoting resource conservation and zero-waste culture. He has been actively engaged in environmental protection work since the late 1980s. He places great concern on several pressing environmental topics, e.g., waste management, climate change, energy conservation, and air pollution.

Mr Lau keeps offering his recommendations and expressing his opinions through media interviews and open letters on several pressing environmental issues confronting humankind. Most of his published letters can be viewed from the following link https://www.scmp.com/author/edwin-lau

Mr Lau is currently a member of the CUHK Jockey Club Museum of Climate Change Expert Committee and a senior advisor of the Hong Kong Solar Industries Association.

In 2009, Mr Lau was awarded the Medal of Honour by the HKSAR Government in recognition of his long-term contribution to the promotion of environmental protection and environmental education. In the same year, he was also awarded an Outstanding Earth Champion by The Earth Champions Foundation.

My Sustainability Goals for 2025:

• More individuals and businesses will act immediately by adopting genuine measures and practices to tackle the escalating environmental crisis.
• The Government will act fast to roll out the much-needed environmental policies and set a good role model for others to follow suit.

Mr Leung Wing Mo was an Assistant Director of the Hong Kong Observatory before his retirement in 2011. His scope of work then included, amongst others, weather forecasting, climatology, and radiation monitoring and assessment.

He was appointed to various advisory bodies of the government, including the Slope Safety Communication Strategic Advisory Committee, Museum Advisory Committee and the Council for Sustainable Development.

Mr Leung is actively involved in environmental and climate change issues in Hong Kong and helped formulate the long-term decarbonization strategy in Hong Kong.
Mr Leung is an adjunct professor of both the Hong Kong Polytechnic University and the Chinese University of Hong Kong.

He is currently the Chairman of the Guangdong Nuclear Safety Consultative Committee, spokeperson of the Hong Kong Meteorological Society, member of Board of Directors of the environmental groups “The Green Earth” and “Conservation E3 Foundation” (CE3), member of the Hong Kong Red Cross Council as well as its Emergency Preparedness and Response Strategic Committee.

Mr Leung is also a TV personality both as the first professional meteorologist in Hong Kong to host local TV weather programmes, and the host of the popular science education programme MObservatory (武測天) of TVB. A total of some 400 episodes of MObservatory were aired between 2018 and 2023.

My Sustainability Goals for 2025:

Cutting down both per capita municipal wastes as well as carbon emission.