On 27 August 2020 the British Council in Malaysia, Yayasan Sime Darby and the Cultural Centre, Universiti Malaya launched the three-year Hubs for Good programme that strives to support Malaysian creative hubs by creating awareness, building capacity, and connecting the creative sector.
The launch shared about the Hubs for Good programmes’ milestones since 2018 and the interrelated ongoing projects including a country-wide mapping and research, a toolkit for the use of creative hub leaders and creative practitioners, a digital platform, and capacity building activities to address skill and knowledge needs of local creative hub leaders.
Yayasan Sime Darby (YSD) plays a key role as co-funder of the three-year programme, enabling the project to double its scope and number of activities. YSD’s support aided one full scholarship and two partial scholarships of three research assistants working on research and the development of a Hubs for Good toolkit and digital platform.
‘YSD believes in the creation of more skilled Malaysians involved in the arts by increasing opportunities for arts education and empowerment towards sustainability. We hope that our support is enabling the participating hubs to thrive while building the capacity of other arts practitioners within their communities. We also aim to see them secure connections with regional hubs as well as local stakeholders, function more efficiently for positive impact, and become key drivers and catalysts for good.
‘We are also very excited about all the new initiatives, innovations and collaborations that will come out of these hub engagements. YSD hopes that this initiative will ultimately support the improvement of national policies in creative industries towards sustainability,’ said Dr Hjh Yatela Zainal Abidin, Chief Executive Officer, YSD.
As a research institution, Universiti Malaya sees this new knowledge provided through the scholarly endeavour can be a catalyst to change paradigms, to aid society in its development and in meeting new challenges as they come along especially in the area of Creative Economy.
‘We are glad that this collaboration has created a triangulation of skills and expertise by combining the strength in each of us, a local and an international establishment spearheading the arts and culture with an academic institution. We believe that this combination shall benefit the society at large by building human capacity and engaging the society closer through a digital platform,’ said Datuk Ir (Dr) Abdul Rahim Hj. Hashim, Universiti Malaya Vice-Chancellor.
Watch the full digital launch here.