The question Hong Kong charities must answer

Hong Kong does not lack institutions that speak the language of service and responsibility. What it lacks, too often, is a clear account of what difference they actually make. That is why the Hong Kong Jockey Club (HKJC) Charities Trust’s first impact report deserves attention.

Publishing such a report may seem like routine institutional business. Up to a point, it is. But its publication opens up a bigger question, one Hong Kong has tended to skirt round: how should organisations with a public or social role be judged?

Large charities, public bodies and companies have become very good at reporting what they have spent and launched, and how many people they have reached. Those figures can show scale, and sometimes efficiency. What they cannot show, on their own, is whether people’s lives have improved, a need was met or a problem eased in any lasting way.

At its best, impact reporting asks a harder question: what changed because the work was done? For a funder with the HKJC Charities Trust’s reach, that is a fair question. As Asia’s leading philanthropic donor, its decision to publish a report of this kind may set a useful example for others in Hong Kong and beyond. Covering 2022-23 to 2024-25, the report reviews the trust’s major programmes and presents early evidence of the difference they have made. It also acknowledges that measurement should involve grantees and beneficiaries, and that its approach remains experimental.