Today, the word "charity", "financial assistance", "aid", "fund", "donation", "contribution", "almsgiving" and etc are among vocabularies that are famously used by institutions, Non-Governmental Organization, religious institutions and etc when calling the public to come forward to lend a help to the needy and less fortunate.

But there is one word that is seldom use but carries a deep meaning to the concept of lending a help and the word is "Philanthropy".

Philanthropy can be broadly defined as love for humankind. It is derived from the Greek words "philos," which means loving and "anthropos," which means humankind. A person who practices philanthropy is called a philanthropist.

The purpose of philanthropy is to improve the wellbeing of humankind by preventing and solving social problems.

Philanthropy is not the same as charity. Charity focuses on eliminating the suffering caused by social problems, while philanthropy focuses on eliminating social problems. For example, giving food to a person who is suffering from a famine is charity. The food helps the person for a short period of time, but the person will become hungry again in the future. Teaching the person how to grow food is philanthropy because it eliminates the social problem causing the person's hunger.

So you see the deep meaning of "Philanthrophy"? Among famous philanthropist in Singapore are Gan Eng Seng, Khoo Teck Puat, Tan Tock Seng, Navroji R Mistri and Syed Omar Ali Aljunied.