Flying books to promote new plane

Hong Kong - Cathay Pacific and Scholastic have teamed up to support a Room to Read educational program to fly 400,000 children's books from the US across Asia under an initiative called Literacy One.

Part corporate social responsibility and part promotion of Cathay's new Boeing 777-300ER, the Literacy One flight takes off in Seattle and arrives at its home base in Hong Kong in November before making its way to Room to Read libraries throughout Asia.

"We are delighted to be able to contribute to such a worthwhile cause as the Literacy One Challenge, which dovetails with our own community goal of helping young people achieve more in life," Christopher Pratt, chairman for Swire Pacific, said.

"We fully support Room to Read's efforts to make books available to more children in Asia and it gives us great pleasure to be able to make use of the delivery of one of our new Boeing 777-300ER aircraft to facilitate their transport from the US to Asia".

Room to Read is a non-profit organisation founded by CEO John Wood who left his job at Microsoft. The organisation partners with local communities in the developing world to establish schools, libraries and other educational infrastructure.