What can Hong Kong do to break poverty cycle? Short-term help just ‘a drop in the bucket’ for poor children, critics say

City needs a comprehensive policy to help poor children avoid staying stuck in poverty, experts say

Various programmes, including new Strive and Rise scheme, are short-term and don’t reach enough kids

Reading Time:6 minutes

Published: 9:00am, 17 May 2023Updated: 9:14am, 17 May 2023

Hong Kong housewife Wong Yuk* has struggled for so long to make ends meet, all she hopes is that life will turn out differently for her three children, aged 14, 11 and seven.

The family gets by on her husband’s monthly income of about HK$20,000 (US$2,550) as a construction worker.

Wong, 42, was worried when her eldest child, in Form Two, fell back in her studies and became depressed during the Covid-19 pandemic.

So when she heard about Strive and Rise, a pilot government programme introduced last year to provide poor children outings, mentors and financial help, she jumped at it and enrolled her daughter.

But so far, she said, the girl had only been on tours to the Convention and Exhibition Centre and Observatory and attended a session on money management.

The scheme also gave her HK$5,000 to spend on her own development. She chose to sign up for private singing lessons, but will have to stop when the money runs out.

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