There may be many broken things in the world, but these honourees from our Asia's Most Influential 2022 list are fixing up their bit by championing the most vulnerable people
Between climate change, the pandemic, income disparities, gender inequalities, racial tensions and a host of other serious issues, the world sometimes seems irreparably broken. While it is true that humanity is grappling with many modern problems, there are also people whose life's work is aimed at finding solutions. While those who come up with big solutions are rightly lauded as heroes, we might also take hope in the work of people who focus on the marginalised communities. With innovative plans and progressive ideas, these leaders on Asia's Most Influential 2022 have made it their mission to ensure that people who are unhoused, who have disabilities, or who are otherwise disadvantaged might find equal opportunities.
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Jeff Rotmeyer, Hong Kong
As the most expensive city in the world to live in, Hong Kong is notorious for its shortage of affordable living spaces. However, Jeff Rotmeyer, a Canadian-born longtime resident of Hong Kong, had already been working as a teacher in the city-state for nine years when he even became aware of the substantial homeless community living rough on its streets. In 2014, a friend brought Rotmeyer to Tung Chau Street Park in Kowloon, where he saw the area’s unhoused community for the first time. That experience, which he described to Tatler as “a real eye-opener”, led him to found ImpactHK three years later.
ImpactHK’s Kindness Walks—which takes volunteers to give food, cash and other basic needs—might be the most visible of its initiatives, but the organisation extends aid in many different ways to unhoused people: assisting in applying for welfare and accommodation, providing counselling services, and offering emergency shelters and co-living schemes. The organisation runs a community centre called 29, and a sports and counselling centre called 100. In 2020 they opened 1ofaKind, a social enterprise that employs ImpactHK’s beneficiaries, along with an online shop called Kindness Matters.
That's not all: Rotmeyer is also the founder of Love21 Foundation, which works to empower individuals with Down’s syndrome and autism through sports, nutrition and support programmes.
Jeff Rotmeyer, who now works full-time at ImpactHK, acknowledges that homelessness continues to be a problem that affects more and more people in Hong Kong every year. “It’s sometimes a little bit lonely, and you do feel pressure,” he told Tatler. “But the key for me is that I’m always on the streets with the homeless community. When you’re that close to the community, it’s easier to come up with better strategies. My favourite part of the job is just having conversations with people outside.”
Read Jeff Rotmeyer's full profile on Asia's Most Influential
In case you missed it: How Jeff Rotmeyer is Creating Positive Change Through His Charities ImpactHK and Love 21
