Charities need to be professional

In 1997, Yang Lan donated the 300,000-yuan ($44,000) she received for her autobiography to Project Hope, a charity providing education to poor children.

The TV host and businesswoman known as China's Oprah Winfrey has been a notable charity figure ever since.

She is now an ambassador for the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) and for the United Nations Development Program (UNDP) in China, as well as the chairperson of the Sun Culture Foundation, co-founded by Yang and her husband Wu Zheng.

She is also the eighth star ambassador of the web portal Sohu's Easy Go channel, a platform for celebrities to engage in charity work and the organizer of various charity projects. She has joined forces with the website to carry out "Care for the New Citizens," which aims to address the lack of art education for migrant workers' children.

"My own child is 10 years old now," Yang says. "I know how important it is for children of this age to get to know art. It is part of the shaping of their personality."

She staged a performance of the National Ballet of China for around 500 migrant workers' children in Beijing in March, where dancers also taught the children basic ballet skills and gave them a brief introduction to the art.

Prior to this in 2007, Yang helped 60 children to participate in a three-month training program with the National Ballet of China. The children performed in a ballet with National Ballet dancers afterwards.

"This year we will invite more top musicians, dancers and painters to join in, providing art education for the children of migrant workers," Yang says. "Their art talents deserve to be found and developed."

Yang, who also promotes the Red Cross Society of China and the Special Olympics, as well as voluntary blood donation, sees charity work as part of life.

"Charity is not difficult, because kindness is in our nature," she says. "But we do need to be professional, otherwise the more money we put in, the more problems we may encounter."

Yang says the recent controversy, alleging fraud by actress Zhang Ziyi's charity, has not compromised her devotion to charity. "Star or not, doing charity is not something you do out of impulse, but continuous and systematic behavior," she says. "I would like to see more celebrities join in, making good use of their influence to help those in need. But I would suggest they focus on one or two projects, such as care for children or environmental protection, and learn to be professional."

China Daily

(China Daily 05/08/2010 page11)