Through this programme, The Starbucks Foundation invites licensees to nominate local nonprofit organisations in their community. This round of grant recipients was selected from more than 100 nominated local nonprofit organisations across 50 markets around the world.

Through the Food Gardens Connect Programme, FoodForward SA aims to teach unemployed people to grow their own food and provides them with equipment, seedlings and hands-on mentoring with a buy-back of their harvest, creating reliable income opportunities and strengthening long-term resilience in underserved communities, says the foundation.

"Food Gardens Connect is showing incredible progress. Seeing lives transformed and communities empowered reminds us that meaningful change is only possible through collective action. A very special thank you to The Starbucks Foundation for helping make this possible," says Andy du Plessis, Managing Director at FoodForward SA. 

"This grant has enabled the expansion of the Food Gardens Connect programme to five new beneficiary organisations, with an estimated 800 people who may benefit," adds du Plessis.

The Starbucks Foundation's Global Community Impact Grants programme aims to support nonprofit organisations driving programmes that create meaningful local or regional impact, expanding on the company's ambition to contribute positively to our communities.

This programme builds on other initiatives of The Starbucks Foundation, including Neighborhood Grants, Origin Grants and Disaster Response Grants — which focus on enabling community resiliency and prosperity and uplifting communities affected by disaster, says the foundation.

Since the programme launch in 2022, The Starbucks Foundation and licensee partners have awarded more than USD$14-million in Global Community Impact Grants to more than 200 nonprofit organisations across more than 60 markets.

"Since the beginning, Starbucks has set out to be a different kind of company — one that prioritises our partners (employees), customers and the communities we serve in locally relevant ways," says Brady Brewer, CEO of International at Starbucks and Board Member of The Starbucks Foundation.

"Through Global Community Impact Grants, we ask our partners to elevate the causes they care about in their communities, and we follow their lead, making donations to the local organisations they care about most," concludes Brewer.

For more information, visit www.about.starbucks.com. You can also follow The Starbucks Foundation on Instagram, or on TikTok.

*Image courtesy of contributor