Home > Press Releases > 2024 > Around 80 newly accredited “Manpower Developers” recognised under the “ERB Manpower Developer Award Scheme” 2024

The Employees Retraining Board (ERB) hosted the “ERB Manpower Developer Award Scheme” Presentation Ceremony 2024 at the Hong Kong Convention and Exhibition Centre today (6 August 2024).  Mr Chris Sun Yuk-han, JP, Secretary for Labour and Welfare, Ms Alice Lau Yim, JP, Permanent Secretary for Labour and Welfare, Mr Yu Pang-chun, GBS, JP, Chairman of ERB, Professor Simon Wong Kit-lung, BBS, JP, Vice-chairman of ERB and Mr Byron Ng Kwok-keung, BBS, Executive Director of ERB officiated the ceremony.

The “ERB Manpower Developer Award Scheme” (“MD Scheme”) was introduced in 2009 to recognise organisations which demonstrate outstanding achievements in manpower training and development as Manpower Developers (“MDs”).  The aim is to instill a corporate culture that emphasises the importance of manpower training and development, and foster a common social value, thereby contributing to enhancing the human capital of Hong Kong.  This year, around 80 private and public organisations are newly accredited as MDs, leading to a cumulative of over 560 MDs across 30 industries.  Among them, around 150 organisations are acknowledged as “Super MDs” after having been awarded the MD status for 10 consecutive years.  

The new MDs including organisations under the “Non-SME”, “SME” and “Government Department, Public Body and NGO” categories, have a combined staff size of over 43,000 employees and recorded over one million training hours during the year.  These MDs proactively empower talent development through leveraging technology such as adopting artificial intelligence and new technologies to support training and create personalised learning experience; fostering employee upskilling to enhance the competitiveness of both the workforce and the organisations, as well as caring for employees’ well-being and promoting the concept of “Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion” in order to build a favourable work environment.

Addressing the ceremony, the Secretary for Labour and Welfare Mr Sun remarked that the Government attaches great importance to prioritising local workers and adopts a multi-pronged approach to help relieve the tight local labour market situation.  Since its establishment in 1992, ERB has been in close partnership with the Government in encouraging members of the public to engage in training and skills upgrading, as a way to mobilise the latent workforce in society.  He added that ERB is currently undertaking a comprehensive review on its retraining services, and would further strategise its service scope, training strategies and operation mode in response to the demand for skilled manpower driven by the changing structure of the labour force and the development of high value-added industries.  He believed ERB would give full play to its societal role and mission of promoting continuous learning and skills upgrading among the general public in alignment with Hong Kong’s economic and manpower development needs, contributing to the establishment of a quality talent ecosystem for Hong Kong.

The ERB Chairman Mr Yu Pang-chun noted in his welcoming speech that the MD Scheme has earned substantial industry recognition over the course of 15 years.  He commended all MDs for not only providing valuable training and development opportunities for their employees, but also acting as a role model that motivates enterprises to invest in nurturing talent, thereby contributing to Hong Kong’s talent pool.  He added that collaboration with industries and employers is pivotal to ERB’s training work.  Over the years, MDs have rendered unswerving support to the various training and collaboration initiatives of ERB, including providing employment opportunities for ERB trainees, as well as joining hands with ERB to nurture talent through the “Hire and Train Scheme”, “Tailor-made Programme” and “One-stop Training and Employment Scheme”, etc, so as to encourage the latent workforce to enter the labour market.

Mr Yu added that in the new era of technological shift and industrial transformation, innovation has become the foundation and engine for enterprise development, as well as a key driving force for future growth.  In line with the innovative development and digital transformation of industries, ERB has been proactively developing training courses pertaining to new skills in recent years and launched the “Love IT‧Upgrading Scheme” to support members of the public in acquiring new digital skills and knowledge on technology applications in industries, with a view to developing multiple skills and enhancing competitiveness of the workforce.

The Hong Kong Quality Assurance Agency is appointed by ERB as the Technical Consultant of the MD Scheme to assess the overall performance of participating organisations in five areas, namely “Leading a Learning Culture”, “Resources Planning”, “Training and Development System”, “Performance Management”, and “Corporate Social Responsibility in Manpower Development”.  Experts in the academia as well as the continuing education and human resources sectors are invited as the Honorary Advisors of the MD Scheme to offer advice on the accreditation framework.  The Scheme has also gained extensive support from trade associations and professional organisations.

The list of newly accredited MDs for this year is at the Annex.  For the lists of “Super MDs” and other MDs, please visit the MD Scheme website: www.erb.org/md. 

Mr Chris Sun Yuk-han, JP, Secretary for Labour and Welfare, Ms Alice Lau Yim, JP, Permanent Secretary for Labour and Welfare, Mr Yu Pang-chun, GBS, JP, Chairman of ERB, Professor Simon Wong Kit-lung, BBS, JP, Vice-chairman of ERB, Mr Byron Ng Kwok-keung, BBS, Executive Director of ERB officiated the “ERB Manpower Developer Award Scheme” Presentation Ceremony 2024.

Mr Yu Pang-chun, Chairman of ERB, stated that ERB will continue to collaborate with all sectors of the community to promote “skill-based” training and services, with a view to supporting members of the public to pursue continuous and lifelong learning.

Mr Chris Sun Yuk-han, JP, Secretary for Labour and Welfare, addressed the ceremony.

Representatives of The Hongkong Electric Company Limited and Pok Oi Hospital, as well as ERB graduate trainees, shared experiences in joining the ERB “Tailor-made Programme” and “Hire and Train” Scheme at the ceremony.

The “Grand Prize Award” was presented to 25 MDs in recognition of their unswerving support to the ERB training courses and collaboration projects.