The 1964 Ramon Magsaysay Award for Journalism, Literature and Creative Communication Arts

BIOGRAPHY of Richard Garrett Wilson and Kayser Sung

In most of Asia today probing, objective economic journalism is a new craft yet it is fundamental to Asian progress. Through the Far Eastern Economic Review, RICHARD GARRETT WILSON, as editor, and KAYSER SUNG, first as deputy editor and now as publisher and managing editor, have been leaders in this profession.

The Far Eastern Economic Review was launched in Hong Kong on October 16, 1946 by a business group led by the Hong Kong and Shanghai Banking Corporation. Hong Kong then was just beginning to recover from the devastation of war and faced an uncertain economic future.

The organizers of the Review had a large stake in seeing that the position and potentialities of the Crown Colony were soundly developed. To achieve this goal the need for an economic journal specializing principally in the finance and commerce of Hong Kong and China was recognized. The publication began under Eric Halpern, with the counsel of J.R. Jones who served until 1964 as Board Chairman.

On the Review’s fifteenth anniversary in 1961 none of the original editorial staff remained but the statement that introduced the first issue was reprinted as a declaration of objectives which still stands:

"The purpose of this weekly economic publication is to analyze and interpret financial, commercial and industrial developments; to collect economic news; and to present views and opinions with the intent to improve existing conditions. Politics and economics being connatural, it will be inevitable that this publication may at times appear to transgress its primary objective by reporting on, and dealing with, political affairs.

"At any time and in every case unbiased and dispassionate, factual and balanced reporting will be our aim and policy . . . . "

The original editorial added that, while dealing prominently with Hong Kong and China, the journal would also concern itself with Pacific and Far Eastern affairs. Its circulation would not be limited to the Far East but would "reach to all parts of the world where information on international trade and finance is required." It would be published in English, the lingua franca in Asia in which bankers, merchants, government officials and students of all nationalities and many tongues converse, negotiate and correspond.

Hong Kong was described as "one of the world's leading hubs," transcending in importance "the mere financial and commercial sphere." As an "international meeting place of the first order," it was a "civilization exchange between East and West." Ideas and conceptions were thought to reverberate from there through the whole of the Far East and "penetrate into the chancelleries of the great powers." It had one of the busiest and biggest harbors, promised to develop a similar airport, was a great trading place and "might soon also grow into a modest industrial city." Business was recognized as "the overriding interest and pursuit," though cultural life had prospered and a thirst for "more and better education, information and knowledge and intellectual satisfaction" was discerned. Civic security was guaranteed under British law. On an optimistic note the editorial concluded that, "given reasonably stable conditions for the future, a period of prosperity will certainly follow."

In the years since 1946, though radical changes on the China mainland meant for Hong Kong the accommodation of over 1.5 million refugees, these high hopes to a considerable extent have been realized. Economic development in Hong Kong has progressed at a rapid rate and the Review has steadily gained in stature with an increasing international readership.

In a fifteenth anniversary message in November 1961 the Governor, Sir Robert Black, GCMG, OBE, noted these achievements and the important role of the economic journal: "By its constructive comment, and by its accurate reporting and informal analyses the Review has contributed towards the solution of our past problems and has helped in particular to secure sympathetic understanding of these abroad. It also keeps both Government and the commercial world advised of developments in neighboring territories, a vital function in an economy which relies almost wholly on exports . . . .

In the early years a reputation for careful, objective reporting was established and the Review gradually incorporated with its Hong Kong and China coverage more and more material about East and Southeast Asia. When RICHARD WILSON joined as editor in 1959 and KAYSER SUNG as deputy editor in 1959, they were able to build on a sound foundation the genuinely regional magazine which today offers, as the editors claim, "an unparalleled documentation of economic developments in the area."

Achieving this distinction amidst the tumultuous events that have shaken so many regions of Asia has been difficult. Governments confronting financial difficulties almost inevitably are reluctant to permit critical examination of the state of economic affairs within their countries. An overriding concern with politics prompts some national leaders to disguise or disregard economic realities. In part because the collection of dependable data is a costly process which few countries have undertaken, statistics often are hard to find and difficult of evaluation. An enormous amount of research and judgment is required to assemble the same information in most countries that can be gotten from a telephone call in a few. The United Nations Economic Commission for Asia and the Far East (ECAFE), the Colombo Plan and other international agencies concerned with economic development in Asia have assisted in furthering statistical research. In this critical field where much remains to be done the Review is making an important contribution.

At the main offices in Hong Kong one-fourth of the 40 staff members are engaged in research and in cross-checking material received from 20 correspondents in Asia and countries with major trade in Asia. The Review maintains extensive files of newspaper clippings, press releases and articles by specialists, classified by countries and subjects in a total of more than 2,000 categories. When new developments occur warranting coverage in the Review a researcher in Hong Kong first refers to these files for background material before a correspondent is cabled for on-the-spot investigation. The Review insists both the writer who prepares the report and the reader who is expected to understand it must have good background information—an element often overlooked in Asia.

Reflecting the personal and professional integrity of its editorial team, the Review is independent and non-partisan, representing neither the views of governments nor of vested interests. Readers benefit from two firm rules, that all materials must be carefully checked and edited and all facts presented in as digestible a form as possible. Evidence of the respect its fair assessment of materials and reliability have earned, were the laudatory messages received on its fifteenth anniversary from the late Prime Minister Nehru of India, Prime Minister Ikeda of Japan, Malayan Prime Minister Tunku Abdul Rahman and other heads of state and ministers throughout Asia.

Indicative of the Review’s broad and discriminating readership—now in almost every country in the world—was the response received to a questionnaire sent last year to all subscribers. The average age of respondents was 38, the average monthly income £306 or US$850. Most were senior employees of big firms and company directors or persons in jobs auxiliary to trade, such as transport and banking. Senior civil servants and diplomats, newspapermen and scholars also replied revealing in total an audience knowledgeable about economic developments and correspondingly critical of economic reporting.

With a circulation in 1963 of approximately 12,000 roughly one-fourth of the subscribers are in Hong Kong, one-half elsewhere in Asia and the remainder mainly in Europe and the United States. Owned now by a three-group consortium—the Hong Kong and Shanghai Banking Corporation, Jardine Matheson and Co. and Sir Elly Kadoorie and Sons—the Review is not published for profit though it has been breaking even since 1961. It is presently in a quandary as to whether to remain essentially a business journal or become a first-class editorial magazine. Editors WILSON and SUNG hope to merge the two interests by building up circulation and advertising to allow for editorial quality without sacrificing business information.

Since 1960 a Yearbook has been published "to make its own modest contribution to better knowledge of South and East Asia by those living in the region and by their friends outside and thereby hasten the process of its necessary economic advancement." The first 150-page Yearbook provided an up-to-date review of economic and business developments and of political and social changes affecting the economies in the area. A number of charts and tables were included in the hope that reliable statistical information would give readers a better understanding of area problems. The latter part of the book was devoted to a review of Hong Kong industry. The material was provided by the Review’s network of correspondents throughout the region and the staff in the Hong Kong office.

In 1961 an increase in the economic and research staff of the Review resulted in a larger and more comprehensive 244-page Yearbook. Country reports were more complete and most were divided into seven sections: politics, the economy, finance, trade, agriculture, industry and power, and transportation. New areas of coverage were Nepal, the Ryukyus and Macao. Under politics were included "all major non-economic developments embracing foreign policy and international events as well as social landmarks and such strictly political matters as elections and government changes." Economic progress was discussed in broad perspective, including treatment of a country's long-term plan and overall objectives of its economic policy, such as socialism or indigenization. Finance covered the latest budget—usually set out in a table—and fiscal and monetary developments, the share market, the cost of living and foreign aid. Trade covered foreign and important domestic trade. A 40-page survey on Asian textiles reviewed the textile position in 19 countries, "covering the present manufacturing and trading position in all leading producer and market countries as well as in those just beginning to replace imports by products of their own domestic mills."

The 1962 and 1963 Yearbooks each began with a regional review of highlights, principal trends and preoccupations that emerged during the year. For example, in 1963 an account was given of the impact of European regroupings, with particular reference to possible British entry into the European Common Market, the continued decline in commodity prices, the greater anxiety about population pressure and the reluctance of rich countries outside Asia to accept Asian manufactures. Also included were short separate reviews of the 1962 work of ECAFE, the Colombo Plan, the Association of Southeast Asia (ASA), and the progress of the projected new Malaysia Federation.

The bulk of both Yearbooks was devoted to the separate review of 28 Asian countries and territories in alphabetical order. Two new features in 1962 were China trade figures from the statistics of partner countries, and Monthly Economic Indicator Tables for India, Burma, South Korea, South Vietnam and Thailand.

In the spring of 1962 the textile survey in the 1961 Yearbook was up-dated and printed separately as an Asian Textiles Annual which is recognized as the authoritative source on this subject. The Review also publishes regular revised editions of a Golden Guide to South and East Asia. In response to trade trends, supplements are published from time to time, the latest being on Switzerland. An Information Service is available to all readers at reasonable charges for any special information required.

Growing recognition of the importance of economic reporting prompted the inclusion of this subject at the International Press Institute (IPI) Fourth Asian Editor's Seminar in March 1962 at Manila. Opening the discussion, A. G. P. Vittachi, the Director of the Asian IPI and 1959 Ramon Magsaysay Awardee for Journalism and Literature, said the Philippine and international committees feel not enough attention is paid in Asia to reporting, interpreting and explaining national development. Economic reporting, he explained, is a new field in most of Asia requiring new techniques. In the newly independent countries, economic reporting was formerly the responsibility of colonial regimes, but it has now become the duty of each national free press to explain how resources are being developed and distributed in the country and how monies are expended. A new brand of journalists to perform this function is growing in Asia, albeit "too slowly." "One of them," Vittachi said in introducing the discussion leader, "is KAYSER SUNG, deputy editor of the Far Eastern Economic Review, a distinguished publication that does objective reporting."

Editors at this seminar agreed that Asia is weak in the field of economic reporting, especially in English, but awareness of its need is increasing. In his seminar paper, SUNG pointed out that in Japan, where this craft has the longest tradition, economic and financial dailies and trade journals are mainly confined to the Japanese language. The Nihon Keizai Shimbun, with a history of 80 years, had no English edition until 1963. Among the few English language journals providing for local and foreign consumption information on economic developments in Japan, the best known are the Oriental Economist and the Stock Journal.

In India, however, where economic reporting is also comparatively well developed, there are two English-language financial dailies, The Financial Express and the Economic Times, which began publication in 1961 in Bombay and now have a circulation of some 15,000 each; and there are at least four English-language economic journals—Commerce, Capital, The Economic Weekly and the Eastern Economist—as well as more than a hundred other trade journals published by prominent trade associations concerned with jute, tea and cotton textiles, etc. There are also special journals dealing with export and import trade and numerous industrial publications devoted to steel, radio, railways, etc.

The seminar discussants agreed that, with the exception of these countries, economic reporting in Asia is spotty. Indonesia appeared to be the farthest behind in developing reliable statistics or other economic information, and it has not encouraged economic reporting.

In this context the Far Eastern Economic Review serves a unique purpose in providing regional coverage in a language comprehensible to most persons concerned with economic affairs throughout the area and in market countries around the world. The two editors responsible for the Review’s growth in recent years both came to the journal professionally well prepared.

RICHARD GARRETT WILSON was born on November 29, 1928 at Epsom, Surrey, England, the only son of a civil engineer. In 1939 he entered Royal Grammar School, Guildford, as a King's Scholar. Enrolled in 1942 at Cranleigh School, Surrey, as an entrance scholar he had his first experience in journalism editing "The Cranleighan." While serving as senior prefect, captain of athletics and maintaining high marks, he was also secretary and later chairman of the Society of School Magazine Editors.

Before going on to university he spent one year in national service as an intelligence officer in the Field Security Headquarters in Graz, Austria. Commissioned in October 1948, he achieved the rank of first lieutenant before returning to Britain to resume his studies.

At Brasenose College, Oxford, from 1949 to 1952, he won first class in shortened honors in Jurisprudence in 1951 and second class Bachelor of Civil Law in 1952. Through his college years he continued to participate actively in athletics. An interest in politics led him to membership in the university Liberal Club and canvassing for the Liberal Party in 1950, though he has since been more often a supporter of the Labor Party. A committee member of the University Peace Association, he was chairman of its forum on world government. Other memberships included the Oxford Union and Press Club. His journalistic bent led him to serve as editor, business manager and in other posts with the "Oxford Guardian."

In 1952 he was awarded a Walter Perry Johnson research fellowship and a Fulbright travel grant to continue his studies in law in the United States at the University of California at Berkeley. A resident of the Berkeley International House, he was chosen vice-president of its student council. His Master of Laws degree was conferred in June 1953.

Setting out to make his way around the world working and writing, he spent the next three months as an unskilled laborer in the goldfields in Livengood, Alaska. From February through June of 1954 he was a temporary part-time lecturer in equity law at Dacca University in East Pakistan. He still lacks the full use of his leg and abdominal muscles as the result of poliomyelitis contracted while traveling on the South Asian subcontinent. Returning to the United Kingdom he decided during his recuperation to take up journalism as a career rather than law.

In 1955 WILSON joined the editorial staff of the Financial Times of London as a feature writer and soon thereafter visited Poland as the paper's representative. Before resigning three years later, he had become labor correspondent covering trade union affairs. From 1956 to 1958 he volunteered occasionally as boy's club leader with the Stepney Family Service Unit in London.

Since 1958 WILSON has served as editor of the Far Eastern Economic Review in Hong Kong. He has also been Hong Kong correspondent for the Manchester Guardian, Australian Financial Review, and the Financial Times, Statist, Director and F.B.I. Review, all of London.

Articles published by WILSON reflect both a scholar and journalist. He has had essays on law in the Modern Law Review, Cambridge, England (1953) and the California Law Review (1955); and literary pieces in the California Literary Review (1953) and The Listener, London (1957). The Colombo Plan Story, an official booklet published on the tenth anniversary of the Plan was authored by him. Asia Magazine in 1962 and 1963 carried his series on Latin America and Africa, and freelance articles on Asian politics and economics have appeared in the Daily Express and Eastern World of London, the Hindusthan Standard and Statesman of Calcutta, the Pakistan Times, Malay Mail, Encounter and the Hong Kong South China Morning Post. Additionally, he has done some broadcasting on economic and social trends for the British Broadcasting Company and Radio Hong Kong.

Keen interest in developing countries and their relationships with other nations has taken him two and a half times around the world and "beyond airports" in 48 countries and territories. He has spent several weeks at various times in most countries of Europe and, since his student year, has visited the United States four times. In South America he concentrated on Mexico, Nicaragua and Brazil, and on two visits to Africa—of some three weeks each in 1958 and 1962—he traveled to Ghana, Nigeria, Chad, Kenya, Sudan, Tanganyika and South Africa. In 1960 he was a member of the Hong Kong delegation to the XII International Management Congress in Australia and since 1958 has made frequent trips in Asia.

His language proficiency made travel rewarding. Fluent in French, he also speaks and reads some German and Spanish and converses in Italian, Mandarin Chinese and limited Japanese.

A collector of books on Asia and Afro-Asian affairs, his wide-ranging curiosity also prompts him to delve into books on pre-, ancient, and modern history; politics; race relations and international affairs. He enjoys poetry, prefers Italian Renaissance art and finds recreation in contemporary novels. With a catholic taste in music, he takes pleasure in opera, classics and jazz and has enjoyed dancing and singing since his school days when he was a member of the Oxford Bach Choir.

RICHARD WILSON became engaged to Sally Backhouse in Venice in August 1962 and the following month the couple were married at Fulham Registry Office in London. They reside in Kowloon, Hong Kong.

Furthering good relations with the business community in Hong Kong, WILSON has served as committeeman of the Federation of Hong Kong Industries and as council member of the Hong Kong Management Association. He is a member of the Hong Kong Rotary Club and, as a former member of the U.K. Chapter of the International House Association, retains membership in the Hong Kong Chapter.

Having come to Asia in the postwar period he classes himself as one of the "new Europeans," who take justifiable pride in Europe's accomplishments but are international in outlook and see the best future in sharing experience and work so that Asia and Africa can achieve rapid economic progress. To this end his personal challenge has been the presentation of readily comprehensible and useful economic news.

SUNG KAI-SHA, born on October 1, 1919 in Nanking, China, was the eldest and only son in a family of four children. As a businessman his father had adopted modern ideas of trade and commerce and from his son's childhood arranged to have him tutored in English so that he one day could work with an English organization. The Anglicized name, KAYSER, which SUNG later adopted, is a transliteration of his Chinese name KAI-SHA.

His regular education in Chinese was received at primary and middle schools in Nanking. He learned accounting and statistics at the Central Academy of Accounts and Statistics in Nanking before entering the Central Naval College at Kiangyin, Kiangsu. In 1937, as Japanese forces advanced toward Shanghai and Nanking, he evacuated with the college to Szechuan Province in West China.

KAYSER SUNG's career as a journalist began in 1941 in Sian in northern Shensi Province, with the Siking Jih Pao (West Capital Daily News), where he concurrently held positions as chief reporter and feature page editor. With the Japanese surrender in 1945 he transferred to the Ho Ping Jih Pao (Peace Daily News) in Nanking. Two years later he joined Reuters News Agency as translator, commercial news writer and reporter, covering the negotiations, truce period and then battles of the Chinese Civil War in Nanking, Shanghai and Canton. To facilitate his reporting for a news agency where minutes counted, he spent five hours every Sunday for one year learning Gregg shorthand. This new tool he credits also with simplifying his way of thinking. In 1949, when the victorious Communist armies swept across the Yangtze and south toward Canton, he transferred with his family to Hong Kong where he remained with Reuters for 10 years as reporter and feature writer. Already possessed of equal facility in English, Mandarin Chinese and the Shanghai and Szechuan dialects, he then mastered Cantonese.

In June 1959 when SUNG joined the Far Eastern Economic Review as deputy editor, he was concerned chiefly with make-up, layout, research and writing articles. His work took him to Japan, Southeast Asia, India and Europe doing extensive research in preparation of special supplements on specific countries in relation to Asia, and on specific commodities.

In 1964 SUNG was appointed concurrently publisher and managing editor of the Review. Apart from his editorial duties he is in charge of management and personnel, including 40-some staff members in the main offices in Hong Kong and 20 regular correspondents in Asia and major Asian-market countries.

He is Southeast Asia Representative for the U.S. Cotton Trade Journal published in Memphis, Tennessee; Hong Kong Industrial Correspondent of the Financial Times of London; and a regular contributor to the London Statist.

Married in Sian in 1944 to Wu I-wen, a former school teacher, actress, dancer and choreographer, the SUNGS have three daughters and one son. The latter, now 11, is a promising pianist.

Conscientious and thorough, SUNG’s vocation and avocation are his work, to which he customarily devotes an "eight day week" or seven 12-hour days. To his wife's occasional remark that he is more married to the Review than to her, his answer is that he "really enjoys the work because the Review does serve its purpose."

RICHARD WILSON and KAYSER SUNG have served well the public good by

their consistently high standards of performance. In keeping with the ideals of good journalism they have sought to discover and present the truth. Their craftsmanship has been guided by a passion to collect facts and make the relevant connections between events so that they derive meaning and significance, thus making an important contribution to Asia's necessary economic advancement.

August 1964
Manila

REFERENCES:

Far Eastern Economic Review. Hong Kong. Vol. 44, no. 12, June 18, 1964, p. 592.

Far Eastern Economic Review, 15th Anniversary. Hong Kong. November 30, 1961, p. 423-25.

Far Eastern Economic Review, 1961 Yearbook. Hong Kong.

Far Eastern Economic Review, 1962 Yearbook. Hong Kong.

Far Eastern Economic Review, 1963 Yearbook. Hong Kong.

New Nation. Singapore. March 24, 1971.

"Shortage of writers on Economics in Asia," South China Morning Post. Hong Kong. October 8, 1964.

Sung, Kayser. "Changing prospects for Hong Kong textiles," South China Morning Post. Hong Kong. September 22, 1965.

Turner, M. W. "An Introductory Message," Far Eastern Economic Review, 1960 Yearbook. Hong Kong.

Interviews with persons acquainted with Messrs. Kayser Sung and Richard G. Wilson and their work.