A general review of Mr. Lim Por-yen’s donations to China, Hong Kong and Taiwan as from as from 1982 (HK$’000 thousands)
Enjoyed donating for charity work and never talked of taking a rest.
(The poem and article in memory of Mr. Lim Por-yen, the industrialist who loved China, Hong Kong and home country)
Lim Por-yen worked very diligently to build up his enterprise. As he achieved success in his business, he never forgot about reciprocating the society. What he had in mind was always doing good work for Hong Kong, for China and his county folks in ChiuChow and Swatow. According to partial statistics, Mr. & Mrs. Lim Por-yen donated nearly 700 million Hong Kong dollars for all sorts of welfare activities in Hong Kong and various places in China.
In the first half of the year 2003, with the attack of SARS, Hong Kong’s economy was further weakened, and nearly 300 people lost their valuable lives. In order to stand up with Hong Kong citizens to fight against SARS, Lim Por-yen donated in a sum of twenty million dollars to Hong Kong-U Research Foundation Fund”. And the “HKU-Lim Por-yen Academic Foundation Fund was also set up to promote the work and research activities of “Jao Chung-I Academic Hall”.
At the cheque-presentation ceremony, Lim Por-yen, who enjoyed donating for charity and doing things himself, gave the following talk: “I myself began living in Hong Kong when I was very young. In the past few-decades, I personally witnessed how Hong Kong delivered from a small fishing harbour to today’s metropolitan city. All that I saw or experienced are deeply kept in my mind, and I can say I have grown with the same space as Hong Kong. “He further said, “This recent attack of the SARS, that took away the precious lives of nearly 300 people made me feel very painful and sad. However, when I saw how Hong Kong people joined hand-in-hand, and how the nursing staff sacrificed their lives in their effort to save the patients, I was really moved by their spirits, and that made my feel proud to be a Hong Kong belonger.” He further stated: “As I have lived in Hong Kong for tens of years, my heart has been tightened with this city, and I hope I can contribute a little effort at this time in support of the anti-SARS research work.”
During the 100-odd days of Hong Kong’s battle against SARS, Mr. Lim Por-yen kept watching newspapers, TV and radio news to see what happened. When he knew that there ware fund-raising activities, he at once responded actively by donating to the charity organizations.
Altogether he donated 3.6 million Hong Kong dollars, of which 500,000 dollars were in support of the “mouth-masks for each and every front-line nursing staff”, 500,000 dollars to the Hong Kong Red Cross Society in support of the “gift of free anti-infection packets”, 100,000 dollars to the Hong Kong Neighborhood Society as funds for anti-infection campaign, $500,000 to “St. Margaret Hospital Charity Fund”, “Kwai Chung/Tsing Yee District Health and Safety Association” for purchase of anti infection equipments for front-line nursing staff, $250,000 to “Industrial/Commercial Sector Fund for Care of SARS Patients”, and $500,000 donation to “ Child Care Educational Fund” to help children who lost their parent during the SARS attack. He also donated $200,000 to support the electronic news-media’s call for support of “I person I doctor” activities. After that, he donated $100,000 to the Community chest, and sponsored $100,000 in support of the “Join-together Walk Against SARS”. Besides, Lim Por-yen donated altogether more than 13 million dollars to Shanghai, Kwangchow and Swatow in support of anti-infection work in the mainland.
For a long, long time, Lim Por-yen kept supporting the education work of Hong Kong without sparing any efforts. At this child age, he studied in Munsang College, Kowloon. In gratitude to his Alma Mater for careful teaching and guidance, he had been actively supporting its scope of construction work, and up to now his donations totalled about 4,600,000 dollars. In 1982, Lim Por-yen donated $100,000 for the construction of “Yan Chai Hospital Lim Por-yen Secondary School” at Tsuen Wan. At the same time, he donated HK$600,000 to sponsor the “Inauguration Ceremony of Yan Chai Hospital’s 32nd Board of Directors” and the Hospital’s “Youth Cantonese Opera Promotion Festival”.
Since the inauguration of the “Healthy Hong Kong Foundation” in 1977, its “Lifetime Express” has gained wide support of Hong Kong People in various sectors, and especially from Mr. Lim Por-yen. As one of the Foundation’s Trustees, he made generous donations many times, thus reaching a total of $10,000,000. On a number of occasions, he himself went with the team to carry out on-the-spot inspections in the poverty areas. Besides, Lim Por-yen donated HK$3,000,000 to support Hong Kong Art Centre’s work to promote culture and art work. To express its gratitude, The Hong Kong Art Centre specially named the cinema house inside “Lim Por-yen Cinema House”.
In year 2003, after donation of a huge sum to Hong Kong University, he made another donation of $10,000,000 in December to Hong Kong Polytechnic University for use as education fund in response to the University’s fund-raising activities. He then donated another ten million dollars to Hong Kong University to establish a foundation fund for “Lim Por-yen Lecture”. Following that, he donated another sum of ten million dollars to support Hong Kong Chinese University’s ophthalmic study and research. When China’s first astronaut visited Hong Kong, Lim Por-yen again donated one million dollars to the Community Chest as a sign of his support for China’s astronaut.
Lim Por-yen was very earnest in providing welfare for his fellow countrymen. All along, he spared no efforts in the educational and welfare works. According to rough statistics, his donations for the welfare of his home-country totalled more than 300 million dollars. 
His donations were for the Swatow International Exhibition Centre, Swatow Lim Por-yen Secondary School, Swatow Lim Por-yen Polytechnic School, Chiuyang Lim Por-yen Secondary School, and Chiuyang U Po-chu School. He also donated 8,000,000 dollars to set up a foundation fund to award teachers and students for their achievement. To enable the people of Chiuchow and Swatow to keep up with the space of the economic era. Lim Por-yen generously donated 40 million dollars to build the Lim Por-yen Library in the city of Swatow. In year 2002, the head officials of Swatow accompanied him to Chengdu, Chiuyang to see the water-supply condition. He personally tasted the water from a well, so as to understand how very eager were the public in solving the difficulty in finding drinking water. He decided to donate $5,000,000 to help Chiuyang and Chengdu to change water supply so what the local people no longer had to worry about it.
In the recent 20 years, Lim Por-yen also widely spread his charity work in China, including Beijing, Shanghai, Kwangchow and Zhong Shan by donating all together over 200 millions of Renminbi. Of this figure, over 100 millions were for the building of SunYat-sen Memorial Hospital in Guangzhou.
Why was Lim Por-yen as very deeply concerned with community affairs? He once told news reporters in a personal interview about his feeling, “Time flies like a horse and people’s life can be rather short. That’s why we should do more good things for our nation and the public, and keep on doing it without stopping. Back in my home-town Swatow, I never made any investment, nor earned any profit. But money that I made from outside should be more often donated to help the elder people back home.” He also said, “Anyone who wants to live fully should always be deeply concerned with the public’s illness and difficulties, and that will bring him a much fuller life.
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