Lingnan University Confers Honorary Degrees Upon Five Distinguished International and Local Personalities

(Hong Kong, 14 November 2005) Lingnan University ("Lingnan" or "the University") will confer honorary degrees upon five distinguished international and local personalities in recognition of their contributions to law, economics, education and community services at its 35th Congregation. They include Mr LIU Lit-mo, The Hon LO Tak-shing and Dr TIN Ka-ping, recipients of honorary degrees of Doctor of Laws, in addition to Dr Supachai PANITCHPAKDI and Prof Joseph E. STIGLITZ, recipients of honorary degrees of Doctor of Social Sciences. Lingnan's 35th Congregation will be held on campus on 12 December 2005 at Chan Tak Tai Auditorium.


Mr Liu Lit-mo

Mr Liu Lit-mo is the Managing Director of Liu Chong Hing Investment Limited and the Vice Chairman and Executive Director of Liu Chong Hing Bank Limited. An outstanding banker, Mr. Liu is also an enthusiast for community service and education. He was the Chairman of Tung Wah Group of Hospitals and is now serving as an Adviser of the Group. Presently, he is a member of the Board of Trustees of the Lord Wilson Heritage Trust, a member of the Board of Trustees and the Endowment Fund Committee of United College, The Chinese University of Hong Kong, Manager of Liu Po Shan Memorial College and President of the Chinese Bankers Club, Hong Kong. He had been holding other public offices, among them were as a member of the Board of Education, a District Governor of Rotary International, the Chairman of Hong Kong Football Association and President of the Hong Kong Chiu Chow Chamber of Commerce. Mr Liu has been appointed a Justice of the Peace and was awarded an MBE (Member of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire) and a Silver Jubilee Medal by Her Majesty the Queen.

Lingnan University confers a Doctor of Laws honoris causa on Mr Liu Lit-mo in recognition of his community involvement and his contributions to the education sector.


The Hon Lo Tak-shing

The Hon Lo Tak-shing is a Lingnan alumnus. He attended Lingan Primary School in Guangzhou and Lingnan Middle School in Hong Kong. He took his MA in Jurisprudence at Wadham College of Oxford University, UK. A solicitor and senior partner of Lo & Lo, Solicitors, he is also a Director and Vice Chairman of the Henderson Land Development Company Limited and a Director of Swire Pacific Limited. In addition to conducting a very distinguished career in law, business, publishing and public life in Hong Kong, the Hon Lo Tak-shing has contributed to the world of education. He was President of the Hong Kong Association for Mentally Handicapped Children and Young Persons and was the initiator facilitating the setting up of the "Lee Shau Kee Wadham College Scholarship" at Oxford University to help students from Hong Kong studying at Wadham. Mr Lo is currently a member of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference. Among his various public offices in the past were being a committee member of the Preparatory Committee of the Hong Kong SAR, the Vice Chairman of the Basic Law Consultative Committee, an ex-Legislative Councillor and President of the Law Society of Hong Kong and others. He was awarded the Grand Bauhinia Medal in July 1997.

Lingnan University confers a Doctor of Laws honoris causa on The Hon Lo Tak-shing in recognition of his contributions to both education and public welfare.


Dr Tin Ka-ping

Dr Tin Ka-ping is a philanthropist with ardent support of education. He set up the "K P Tin Foundation", through which donations have been made to education institutions, hospitals, libraries and others on Mainland China, in Hong Kong and Taiwan. Lingnan University is also one of the Foundation's beneficiaries and has been receiving funding in aid of its installation of facilities and for the establishment of the "Lingnan University Tin Ka Ping Student Loan Scheme". Moreover, Dr Tin demonstrated his support of Lingnan's vision of liberal arts education by attending its university forum. He is best remembered for selling his luxurious residence in the wake of the 1997 Asian financial crisis in order to obtain funding to honour his donation commitments made earlier to various education projects on the Chinese mainland since the financial crisis had made negative impact on the income of the Foundation. A recipient of many accolades and awards, Dr Tin was made a Member of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire (MBE) and he is the fifth Chinese who has an asteroid named after him by the Purple Mountain Observatory in Nanjing.

Lingnan University confers a Doctor of Laws honoris causa on Dr Tin Ka-ping in recognition of his contributions to both society and Lingnan University.


Dr Supachai Panitchpakdi

Dr Supachai Panitchpakdi is currently Secretary-General of the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD). He was Director General of World Trade Organization (WTO), and was twice the Deputy Prime Minister of Thailand, taking charge of the country's economic policies.

A staunch supporter of free and fair trade, Dr. Supachai received his Ph D in Economic Planning and Development at Erasmus University in Rotterdam. In 1974, he began his professional career at the Bank of Thailand. In 1992 - 1995, he was Thailand's Deputy Prime Minister, overseeing the country's economic and trade policy-making. During his tenure, Dr Supachai was actively involved in international policy and played a vital role in the Asia-Pacific Economic Co-operation (APEC) and in the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN). He also promoted efforts to liberalise trade in the region through what has now become the ASEAN Free Trade Area (AFTA). He has played instrumental roles as initiator and active supporter of numerous trade and investment facilitating fora, groupings and development projects such as the formation of the Asia Europe Meeting (ASEM), the Greater Mekong Sub-region (GMS) and the Bangladesh, India, Myanmar, Sri Lanka and Thailand Economic Co-operation (BIMSTEC) consultative group. In the wake of Thailand's financial crisis in 1997, Dr Supachai was reappointed Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Commerce.

In 2002, he became the Director General of WTO. In September 2005, he became Secretary-General of the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD). His career is characterized by his passion for facilitating the development of international relations, investment and trade.

Dr Supachai has enjoyed a high reputation in the world of academe. He served as a Visiting Fellow at Cambridge University and Visiting Professor at the International Institute for Management Development, Lausanne, Switzerland. He has published a number of books, including Globalisation and Trade in the New Millennium, and China and the WTO: Changing China Changing World Trade, which he co-authored with Mark CLIFFORD. He is currently Chairman of the Board of Governors of Yonok College in Lampang, Thailand, a post he has held for the past thirteen years.

Lingnan University confers a Doctor of Social Sciences honoris causa on Dr Supachai Panitchpakdi in recognition of his outstanding services to his country, for his resolute efforts to promote trade and development in the South-East Asian region in particular and in the world as a whole, and for his significant contributions to academe.


Prof Joseph E. Stiglitz

Nobel laureate in Economic Sciences in 2001, Prof Joseph E. Stiglitz is presently a professor with Columbia University, USA. His work touches the lives of people around the world and has made major contributions in practically every subfield of economics from urban and regional to international economics, from development and financial economics to industrial organization and labor economics, covering both macro and micro areas.

Prof Stiglitz received his liberal arts education at Amherst College and obtained his Ph D from Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). At the age of 27, he was hired by Yale as a tenured full professor. He subsequently taught at Princeton, Oxford and Stanford. In 1993, he joined the Council of Economic Advisors. In 1997 - 2000, during his tenure as Senior Vice-President and Chief Economist with the World Bank, he was outspoken on many issues from competition policy to poverty relief and from banking regulation to sustainable development.

Soon after he left the World Bank, Prof Stiglitz founded The Initiative for Policy Dialogue (IPD) to help developing countries explore policy alternatives. In 2004, he started to serve as editor for The Economists' Voice.

Prof Stiglitz is well known for his bold ideas challenging mainstream, conventional ideas. In 2001, he was ready to go back to academia, where he could speak more openly. He joined Columbia University in the same year and has subsequently published several of his many works, including Globalisation and Its Discontents, The Roaring Nineties, and Towards a New Paradigm of Monetary Economics (with Bruce GREENWALD, Cambridge University Press).

Prof Stiglitz has more than refereed 300 papers to his credit and numerous honours apart from the 2001 Nobel Prize in Economic Sciences, including the John Bates Clark Medal.

Lingnan University confers a Doctor of Social Sciences honoris causa on Prof Joseph E. Stiglitz in recognition of his remarkable service to mankind and for the rare combination of research rigour and understanding of the practical problems confronting the real world.

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