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“ COME, which targeted Wan Chai

The core value of the scheme is promoting residents, was launched in December
2001 to promote using time coupons
mutual aid in elderly communities. to exchange goods and services.
“People can join COME after un-
derstanding the whole project and the
concept of the time bank. Members
” will receive time coupons when they
Across the City with Sham Shui Po residents during complete voluntary services, such as
Ko Ming-hui, a supervisor of Sham briefing sessions,” she says. household cleaning and childcare.
Shum Fook, has assisted elderlies to Ko thinks recruiting members is Later when they need help, they can
run a time bank in Tseung Kwan O difficult as they lack manpower and use time coupons to exchange goods
and services,” she explains.
since 2016 under Hong Kong Sheng resources to promote the scheme to The first event they had was a ba-
Kung Hui Welfare Council. the whole community. The scheme
“Upon retirement, I have co-or- now has 40 members. zaar in Wan Chai in 2002. There were
ganised Sham Shum Fook with Peo- “Sham Shui Po is too big. We are stalls of traditional craftmanship, such
ple Serving Centre, an NGO serving now promoting in two estates by set- as threading and Chinese paper cut-
ting. Members and stall owners used
the underprivileged in Sham Shui Po. ting street counters and distributing time coupons in exchange for services
As what the elderlies living in Tseung leaflets, but many other estates have
Kwan O hope, we promote time banks not been covered,” she says. and products with one another.
in Hong Kong,” the former social “For example, some farmers sold
worker says. The Pioneer vegetables to get time coupons, which
they could use to exchange for foods
Since March 2021, Ko has assisted Another time bank advocator, or recruit members to help with farm-
the Sham Shum Fook preparation Dora Cheng Shuke Ching, had been
committee to run the time bank by involved in a time bank scheme ing,” she adds.
promoting it to more people. named St. James Settlement Commu- They then held more diversified
“I try to raise people’s awareness by nity-Oriented Mutual Economy Pro- events including tutorial class match-
explaining the scheme and interacting ject (COME) before leaving in 2017. ings. Now COME has around 2000
members.
According to an evaluation study
on COME conducted by the Hong
Kong Polytechnic University in 2015,
over 170 COME members were polled
and more than half of them thought
COME improved living standard and
community connections.
Cheng is now an entrepreneur sell-
ing organic foods and healthy prod-
ucts. Using what she has learnt at St.
James’ Settlement, she plans to adopt
the concept of the time bank to her
business for the sake of community
mutual supports.
“I am still thinking of ways to ex-
change time. The target group will be
the middle class or people who under-
stand the concept of green money. For
example, I will collect time coupons
when I teach tea brewing,” she says.
Dora Cheng Shuke Ching teaching tea brewing and selling organic
health products in her shop located in Prince Edward.