loader image

Hong Kong’s First Global Goals Jam

by | Sep 26, 2018

Hong Kong’s first Global Goals Jam

Hong Kong’s first Global Goals Jam took place last weekend, on 22-23 September 2018. The event was organised by Loftwork Hong Kong and SUSTAINHK, implementing a design thinking curriculum developed by The United Nations Development Programme and the Digital Society School (Amsterdam University of Applied Sciences). The event was hosted at nakedHUB New Street and MTRL HK (Loftwork’s creative lounge).

Taking place in over 70 cities around the world, the Global Goals Jam is a two day event consisting of short design sprints. Creative teams, with designers, developers and Jammers from the local community will work together using a tailored toolkit. The main goal of the Jam is to create interventions aimed at short term targets in support of the long term goals. These ambitions are similar to some of the social impact that the Shared Value Project also looks to instill into its collaborations and projects.

Every year, the Global Goals Jam focuses on five main goals. Organisers of local chapters then create local challenges for the teams that relate to one of these goals. Together with United Nations Development Programme, GGJ selected the following goals for 2018:

 

Shared Value Project

 

On Day One (Saturday), teams were formed organically by aligning the participants’ areas of interest and passion for the SDGs of their choosing, as well as their skills and expertise. Using design methods such as “Actors Map” and “Empathy in Action”, participants were encouraged to brainstorm and research solutions to their chosen goals. Participants were then asked to respond to the goals by building concept ideas and evaluating their Impact vs. Feasibility, with support from mentors throughout.

On Day Two (Sunday), teams were tasked to make their concept: They were asked to get creative and sketch their concepts and put together prototypes using various materials from MTRL, with access to laser-cutting and 3D printing services. Finally, the participants were asked to test and evaluate their concept and product pitches by considering their “People, Planet, Profit” effects and to finalise their business models and presentations.

On Sunday evening, eight teams pitched their concepts in response to solving their respective SDGs during the final presentations, to a panel of four judges representing different sectors. Some amazing and innovative solutions were proposed, such as Learn Cha, a knowledge and skills-sharing online platform for Hong Kong’s elderly community; She Leads Family, a grassroots education initiative to empower the underprivileged and underserved “invisible women” of Hong Kong; and Wattsup, which aims to design the perfect ‘green school’ from an energy efficiency and renewable energy perspective.

The GGJ HK organising team consisted of Eda Chow from Loftwork Hong Kong, a Japan-based design and innovation consultancy for public and private sectors, government and corporations; and Christopher Pang and Vince Siu from SUSTAINHK, a local action-oriented platform powered by the Global Shapers Community aimed towards making Hong Kong a more sustainable city.

Share This