The team representing Macao, made up of local young people Sam Ka Lok, Loi Nga Hei and Cai Pei Jun, went to Hong Kong to participate in the Grande Finale of the “Coding4Integrity Asian Youth Anti-Corruption Hackathon” co-hosted by the Independent Commission Against Corruption of Hong Kong, the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) and the International Association of Anti-Corruption Authorities (IAACA) With the prototype of an AI-powered public procurement analysis platform for corruption prevention designed by them, the team stood out from all the competing teams from 14 countries and regions and won the gold award and a few more awards in the International Contest of the Hackathon. The CCAC stated that it will continue to actively tie in with the country and Macao SAR’s policy direction of attaching importance to the development of young people and encourage them to participate in integrity building of the country and Macao with innovative thinking so that Macao young people will show their talent at the international stage.

The CCAC held the Macao preliminary round in May and selected two teams to represent Macao in the International Contest and the Regional Contest of the Hackathon held in Hong Kong between 15^th and 19^th September. Participating teams were required to develop a digital solution prototype for the purpose of assisting in tackling the challenges related to corruption in Asia. The CCAC joined hands with the co-organiser of the Macao preliminary round, the Macau Productivity and Technology Transfer Center, to provide the two teams with various professional training and technical support.

During the Grande Finale of the International Contest on 19^th September, 14 teams of Asian youth elites including the Macao team presented and demonstrated their solution prototypes to the judge panel made up of experts in the related fields from the organisations such as UNODC. They introduced how to combat corruption by means of technology. Then the judges rated the solutions based on the criteria including relevance and impact, presentation quality, technical implementation, innovation and creativity. Finally, the Macao team “Just do”, made up of Sam Ka Lok, Loi Nga Hei and Cai Pei Jun, won the gold award with the prototype of an AI-powered public procurement analysis platform named “BidTrust”. The team also won the “Audience’s Favourite”. The winning solution designed by the Macao team aims to help public departments in enhancing the efficiency of assessing tender documents in procurement processes and detecting possible irregularities in order to prevent corruption. The winning teams’ innovative thoughts were highly commended and the gold award winning team will be arranged to present its corruption prevention solution at the Conference of the States Parties to the United Nations Convention against Corruption which will take place in Doha, Qatar at the end of this year. In addition, both of the Macao teams participating in the International Contest and the Regional Contest won the “Friend of Hong Kong” award.

All the members of the Macao teams thought that this was a precious experience and a high-quality exchange in corruption fighting among young people, which inspired them to have a more in-depth thinking of the development of integrity building. Winner of the International Contest Sam Ka Lok said that the Hackathon enabled him to gain more knowledge of corruption fighting and he would continue to improve his capability and put the experience and knowledge of integrity building learned from the Hackathon into practice in order to make more contribution to the society of Macao. Cai Pei Jun said that it was a fruit experience to exchange ideas on integrity building, technology and creativity with the young people from various places, which benefited him a lot and helped him broaden his international vision. Loi Nga Hei hoped to continue to exchange with young people worldwide so that the strength of Macao young people would be seen by the world and bring their international experience back to Macao.

The CCAC appreciated the hard work of the young representatives of Macao for preparing for the Hackathon and felt encouraged by the outstanding achievements made by the Macao team. In the future, the CCAC will continue to provide local young people with various opportunities and encourage them to broaden their international vision in order to facilitate integrity building of the country and Macao.