Community
Sands China has been rooted in the city for two decades and is committed to giving back to the local community that it calls home. The company has been fulfilling its corporate social responsibility with concrete action to support local disadvantaged groups and implement sustainable measures to bring a positive impact to the city – together making Macao an ideal place to live, work and visit. In addition, Sands China has sponsored and organised major sports events in support of the development of the local sports industry and to promote the integrated development of sports, culture and tourism.
A group of Sands Cares Ambassadors attended the annual celebratory event of Tung Sin Tong Thanksgiving Day. The ambassadors learned a lot about Tung Sin Tong's service, history and its Chinese medicine culture after a tour to its facilities, where they enjoyed some performances and played at the game booths.
Sands China distributed food kits to the elderly at Caritas Macau's Brilho da Vida Elderly Centre June 15, as part of the Sands Cares Food Kit Build. Our Sands Cares Ambassadors will assemble and distribute a total of 3,000 food kits, comprising 2️1 tons, to those in need in the community – including elderly residents, the disabled, poor families, aid recipients, and food bank recipients – at Caritas Macau's service centres from now until March 2024. Each food kit contains a total of 18 food items, including staple foods like oil, rice, macaroni, canned food, biscuits, and others. This event is one of our most inspiring yet, since our team members work hand-in-hand to provide relief to people in need and because we are part of a larger effort with our sister property, Marina Bay Sands, who is making the same impact in the Singapore community.
Organised by Sands China and Macau Red Cross, and co-organised by Centro de Apoio Múltiplo à Família "Alegria em Harmonia" da Associação Geral das Mulheres de Macau, two disaster preparation parent-child workshops were successfully held on June 24, attracting a total of 100 children and their parents. The interactive workshops covered topics such as disaster preparation at home, emergency shelters, channels for receiving accurate disaster information, and an introduction to the Sands Cares emergency response kits, which the Sands Cares Ambassadors distributed to each participating family at the workshops. These disaster preparation parent-child workshops are part of the 2023 Sands Cares Disaster Preparation & Emergency Response Kit Program, which aims to build disaster preparedness awareness and strengthen the local community’s emergency response capabilities.
Sands Cares Ambassadors and members of the Macau Special Olympics and Richmond Fellowship of Macau completed the 5km Fun Run together at the 2023 Sands China Macao International 10K on March 19. Through activities like this, we hope to build an inclusive and harmonious community, while at the same time encouraging the public to maintain their physical wellness through exercise.
Sands China hosted a parent-child sports day for 50 members of the Women's Association of Macau March 18. As the event was timed to coincide with the Sands China Macao International 10K held the next day, Sands Cares Ambassadors and the group spent a great afternoon playing some Sands 10K-themed games, aimed at promoting the importance of family bonding and parent-child communication. They showed their teamwork skills at The Venetian Macao's Grado mini golf field and painted their very own medals at a workshop in the Sands 10K themed interactive zone, after which they enjoyed a fun time together at the Qube Kids' Zone.
Sands China recently organized two sessions of a Clothing Upcycling Workshop for our team members, where local environmental organisation Green Future demonstrated the impact of fast fashion on the environment, in turn encouraging us to reduce our consumption and support second-hand clothing shops to minimize our carbon footprint. What's more, the participants also learned how to transform old T-shirts into reusable shopping bags – encouraging us to rethink our consumption of fast fashion and adopt sustainable practices in our daily lives to create a more sustainable future.
For the 10th year in a row, local community group volunteers joined Sands China team members at The Venetian Macao to assemble hygiene kits for Clean the World, an international social enterprise that distributes essential hygiene supplies to populations in need around the globe. On December 1, approximately 200 volunteers from Sands China and the Rotary Club of Macau joined together at Cotai Expo to build over 27,000 hygiene kits – which include soap from Sands China's operations that has been sterilised and recycled through Clean the World's remanufacturing process. Global charity Children International will distribute the kits to families in need in the Philippines, contributing to a healthier, more sustainable world for all.
Sands China recently organized two tours – one for a group of 113 students from Santa Rosa de Lima English Secondary School and another for 20 students from the University of Saint Joseph (USJ) – where they visited the back-of-house area of The Venetian Macao and explored some of our facilities such as waste management and recycling programs. They got to witness the company's long-term dedication to sustainable integrated resort operations, with our sustainability team showing the students our energy-saving technologies and water conservation practices. Through events like this, we hope to encourage the students to adopt sustainable approaches in their daily lives and contribute to environmental protection.
Organised by the Institute of Science and Environment (ISE) at the University of Saint Joseph (USJ) and sponsored by Sands China Ltd., The Sea of Plastic: A Recycled Art Exhibition held its opening and award ceremony June 5 at The Venetian Macao. In celebration of World Environment Day, which happened to coincide with this event, Sands China turned off exterior lights and non-essential indoor lights at its properties for one hour in support of the annual global event, in a bid to encourage worldwide awareness and action to protect the environment. The exhibition showcases a collection of artworks produced by local artists and participants of the Plastic Pollution Artwork competition, who are currently pursuing studies at various levels. The featured pieces emphasised the detrimental effects of plastic pollution on the environment, offering a range of interpretations of the plastic pollution in our oceans and coasts theme. All artworks have been exclusively created or composed from fully recycled or reused materials.