Tan Yu

Tan Yu (Chinese: 鄭周敏, April 5 1927 – 12 March 2002) was a Chinese philanthropist and businessman who founded the Asiaworld International Group and established the KTTI Foundation. In 1997, Forbes estimated his net worth to be about $7 billion, ranking him as one of the 10 richest men in the world, and making him the wealthiest man in the Philippines. Some projects were affected by the 1997 Financial Crisis

Originally from Fujian province in China, Yu and his family moved to the Philippines at a young age. He began making a living in Camarines Norte through selling bread buns in the streets and doing some fishing. He graduated from University of St. La Salle in Bacolod City, and in 1997, received an honorary doctorate of science degree from the New Jersey Institute of Technology. By the age of 18, he had established a textile business, and had made his first million pesos.

During his lifetime, he planned to develop Fuga and Barit, two northernmost islands in the Philippines, into a resort in the Pacific for businessmen and tourists. Under the company Asiaworld, he possessed more land in the Philippines than the government, as well as possessing overseas assets in the form of property, hotels and banks, totaling $12 billion, as estimated by CNN Asiaweek.

Tan Yu was the buyer of Fantasy Gardens in Richmond, British Columbia in the late 1980s. His preferential treatment by the Lieutenant-Governor and $20 000 unexplained cash payment to Premier Bill Vander Zalm, the seller of the park, led to Vander Zalm's resignation in disgrace in 1991, trial for criminal breach of trust, and the collapse of the British Columbia Social Credit Party in the 1991 provincial election.

Tan Yu died of heart failure in Houston, Texas, in 2002 at the age of 75. Jose de Venecia, the Speaker of the House of Representatives in the Philippines, commended his achievements as a great businessman and as a philanthropist, for providing jobs to a number of Philippine people. He was posthumously honored with the Dr. Jose P. Rizal Award for Excellence.