SRI AMAN, July 17: Batang Ai’s first community library is now under the guardianship of the Nanga Ukom longhouse residents.
The library was presented to the longhouse chief by the organising committee of the Asia Pacific Regional Hub (APRH) Congress for the 59th International Congress and Convention Association (ICCA) in a handover ceremony held at the longhouse on July 15.
The ‘Gift of Love: Batang Ai Community Library’ was a Congress-led corporate social responsibility (CSR) project undertaken by the 59th ICCA APRH Committee, which originated from a book-sharing programme and then expanded into a life-changing initiative with the support of the public and private sectors.
The Committee’s State Coordination chairman Hii Chang Kee who is also the permanent secretary of the Sarawak Ministry of Tourism, Creative Industry and Performing Arts, said the public and private sectors have an even bigger responsibility than ever before towards the development of Sarawak through community outreach programmes.
“The best way to achieve the Sarawak government’s three aspirations of economic prosperity, social inclusion and environmental sustainability is by working alongside the local community, and our business events sector is leading the way in showing how the right intentions and partnerships can make a big impact on people,” he said in a statement recently.
The library aims to provide a functional space with educational resources to help retain more rural children in schools.
Yet, as simple as the goal sounds, the methods to achieve that goal needed international expertise and a stamp of approval from the ICCA.
ICCA’s Asia Pacific regional director Waikin Wong said the Association had spent years advocating positive societal impacts through business events.
“Sarawak raised the bar for the global business events sector when they announced this initiative as a Congress-led CSR project.
“It’s time for sector players to think about how they can make an impact in their own community, and we hope that more initiatives will be taken to transform global economies and societies,” he said.
Business Events Sarawak (BESarawak) won the bid in 2019 and adopted ICCA’s ‘Gift of Love’ CSR programme.
The main congress in Kaohsiung of southern Taiwan was hosted as a spoke-and-hub model, and Kuching was the hub for Asia Pacific, held from Nov 1 to 3, 2020.
As Congress host, Sarawak took a step further from the book-donation-only concept to build a community library that works with the local people on a long-term programme.
The 59th ICCA APRH Committee’s viral book donation campaign in 2020 saw 7,500 books donated in nine days to furnish the library.
The biggest book donation came from the residents of Raflessia in Petaling Jaya, who generously donated over 1,200 books.
The ‘Gift of Love: Batang Ai Community Library’ was exclusively sponsored by Sarawak Energy Berhad in collaboration with Place Borneo, Conference People, the 55th ICCA 2016 Local Host Committee (Borneo Convention Centre Kuching), the Librarians’ Association of Malaysia, Sarawak State Library and CPH Travel Agency.
For more information on this library, please email Rose Bruce at rose@sarawakcb.com. — DayakDaily
