Chair Professor Joseph Hun-wei LEE, Vice-Chancellor and President of the Macau University of Science and Technology, has been awarded Honorary Fellow by the Hong Kong Institute of Engineers (HKIE). The HKIE held the 45th Annual Dinner recently, at which various awards were conferred in recognition of distinguished engineers’ contributions to the Institute, the profession, the industry, and society. President LEE received the Institute’s highest honor for his outstanding hydraulic and environmental engineering contributions.
Ir Aaron K M Bok (left) presenting the HKIE Honorary Fellow 2023 award to
President Joseph Hun-wei LEE(right)
Founded in 1947, the Hong Kong Institute of Engineering has been significantly influential in Hong Kong’s engineering and technology circles. By 1982, the Hong Kong Government officially entailed the Institute’s statutory membership as a qualification for civil service employment as a professional engineer, recognizing the role and status of the HKIE in the engineering and technology industries of Hong Kong. The honorary fellow is the highest level of membership available in the Institute. This honor places President LEE in the ranks of distinguished former recipients such as Sir Sze-yuen Chung, Dr. Zhang Youqi, Sir Charles Kao, Sir Gordon Wu, Dr. Paul Chu, Dr. Xu Kuangdi, and Dr. Lee Chack-fan.
As an internationally renowned and acclaimed scholar in the field of environmental water resources, President Joseph Hun-wei LEE has dedicated his life’s work to conducting basic and applied research in this area. He has received many awards for his research on hydraulics applied to environmental issues, including the ASCE Hunter Rouse Hydraulic Engineering Award, the China State Scientific and Technological Progress Award, the ASCE Karl Emil Hilgard Hydraulic Prize, the Croucher Senior Research Fellowship, the Da Yu Water Science & Technology Prize, and the Hong Kong Construction Industry Council’s Innovation (Sustainability) Award.
President LEE currently serves as the President of the International Association for Hydro-Environment Engineering and Research (IAHR), the first Chinese scholar to lead this long-established and prestigious international organization. He has served as an expert consultant on several large-scale municipal infrastructure projects in Hong Kong, using cutting-edge hydrodynamics and innovative technologies to solve complex engineering problems. He has collaborated with several Hong Kong government departments on water safety issues, including the Agriculture, Fisheries and Conservation Department, the Environmental Protection Department, the Drainage Services Department, and the Water Supplies Department, among others. His professional insights and perspectives have made significant contributions to Hong Kong's water safety and environmental protection, particularly in response to climate change.
President LEE has also been appointed to serve as a member of various government or public consultation bodies in different fields, including the Central Policy Unit, the Land and Construction Advisory Committee, the Environmental Advisory Committee, the Hong Kong Research Grants Council, and the Public Policy Research Funding Scheme Review Committee. Additionally, he is a panel member of the Expert Committee on Reclamation and Coastal Defense of Kau Yi Chau Artificial Islands.
The Honorary Fellow title of the Hong Kong Institute of Engineering recognizes President Joseph Hun-wei LEE’s outstanding contributions to the field of water and environmental engineering and to Hong Kong. President LEE hopes that through this award and his many years of research and experience in environmental hydrology, he can boost the University’s academic prowess and social contributions, and encourage more attention from society and the scientific community to the challenges of climate change, water safety, and coastal ecological environment in the Greater Bay Area, join China’s efforts at ecological civility, and make more contributions to our society and environment.
