HKU SPACE’s Go Cambridge competition keeps entrepreneurial spirit high

We seldom stop for a moment to consider what it means for someone not to know their date of birth. UNICEF reports that only half the children in the world are registered, with numbers especially low in sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia. The list of the consequences of not having a birth date is long.

“Without authentic birth documents, these children are more vulnerable, from quiet discrimination to anti-social activities including child labour, early marriage, prostitution, inappropriate sentencing following criminal offences, and other dangers that come from being ‘invisible’,” says dentist Dr Jayakumar Jayaraman, a PhD student at the University of Hong Kong (HKU).

Working with a research team in Britain, Jayaraman has developed an evidence-based method of estimating age from dental development. Aware of the serious consequences of not having any birth records, in 2013, Jayaraman set up the Date of Birth (DOB) Foundation, the first charity in the world for the improvement of birth registration policies globally and providing ages for children without birth records.

This and eight other outstanding local entrepreneurial initiatives have been given support by the HKU School of Professional and Continuing Education (HKU SPACE) Go Cambridge Enterprise Competition 2014 programme, which gives full sponsorship to postgraduate students to participate in a tightly organised four-day study trip to Cambridge. 

“Applicants had to put together a business plan or research proposal for a product which they believed would be commercially viable or could be put into practice as a social enterprise,” says Dr Josephine Jim, HKU SPACE’s associate head and senior programme director at the College of Business and Finance, who is also the programme’s facilitator.