Tag Archives: nonprofit quarterly

The following is a transcript of the video above, from our webinar on “Remaking the Economy: Black Food Sovereignty, Community Stories.” View the full webinar here.

Pastor Keith Davis: It’s interesting. I’ve just returned from spending two weeks in Egypt and took a cruise down the Nile and heard how fertile the land is, and how it was once the breadbasket that fed the world. And today, they lack, and they have to buy food because of the politics. It’s so interesting, because some of what I heard in Egypt and Africa is very similar…So let me say this. In the inner city we have, in our nonprofit we’ve been in, we’ve had a food pantry for 30 years. And it’s the same cycle. Same people. In fact, the faces haven’t changed over the decades. As I said, at our core, we’re technologists, we’re engineers, we’re a bunch of geeks. But we’re community centric. We’re serving our community.

As a pastor in the city for—I won’t age myself, but—decades, I’m concerned about the people. So, when the opportunity presented itself to leverage our tech background with moving our traditional food pantry into a sustainable model where we don’t have this charitable model any longer, but we have a model that really is sustainable, it was a no-brainer for our team. We are envisioning, through investments that we’re currently making, that we’ll be able to stand up [in] an inner city, on blacktop, a container that is a farm that produces fresh vegetables, so that we can distribute to the folk who live in our city. And we’re wanting to have a project that demonstrates success and replicate that throughout our region and make it available to other traditional farmers and other cities in our area and connect it with healthcare community. So, the idea of an ecosystem becomes extremely important where, again, as a nonprofit, we’re not looking for what is our singular win in this, but what is the collective impact that we can achieve by bringing partners and offer[ing] services that complement what we’re doing here in the city of Camden?

This article originally appeared in the Nonprofit Quarterly. See the original article here.

In Nigeria, as in the US, people are looking for ways to fight food insecurity and maintain agricultural production amidst climate change and the changing rainfall patterns—including increased flooding—that it is triggering. The intense flooding that the US dealt with at the start of this year has been commonplace in Nigeria for decades, but this past September, Nigeria saw particularly intense and frequent flooding that destroyed homes and crops, causing massive displacement and food shortages. Though they receive little government help, Nigerian farmers have begun to pick up the pieces by exploring new strategies for climate-smart farming, strategies that US farmers can implement to help build a more resilient future.

This past September’s flooding was devastatingly similar to historic flooding that took place in Nigeria in 2012. September’s floods displaced 1.4 million people and partially destroyed over 176,000 hectares (approximately 434,900 acres) of farmland. That’s about the size of 510 New York City Central Parks. More than 392,000 hectares (approximately 968,650 acres) faced total destruction, detailed Sadia Farouq, Minister of Humanitarian Affairs, in a Punch report.

Nigeria is among the top-20 largest producers of rice in the world, but recent flooding puts the country at risk of losing its top grain-producing spot. The floods are also straining Nigeria’s $10 billion in imports, which make up for the country’s agricultural and food-production shortages. Thirty-four out of 36 states in the country were impacted, exposing the country to severe food shortages in the coming months.

Some farmers are still grappling with the destruction. “I reside in Bayelsa [a state in Southern Nigeria], one of the worst hit states by the flood, and it affected over 80 percent of its populace,” says Elohor Akaka. Akaka’s family cultivates common food crops like yam and maize. Floods destroyed their homes, farms, and properties. For farmers like Akaka, the impact of floods has been damning.

Nguvan Dorcas, a small-scale rice farmer in Benue state, otherwise known as “the food basket of the nation,” said she was just about to cultivate her rice farm, which covered two hectares of land (approximately five acres) before the floods came. She had spent up to 400,000 naira (USD $1,000) on equipment, seeds, and fertilizers to ensure healthy crop growth, but nothing could be salvaged from the floods.

“My crops were the healthiest this year and the best set I have ever planted, but the water took everything away,” she said. For sustenance, Dorcas and her family have relied on her husband’s farm, which was less impacted by flooding.

Local farmers have started adopting proactive measures to combat the impacts of floods and drought and are using changing rainfall patterns as an opportunity to influence high-yield crop production and combat food scarcity.

The Nigerian government has a $2-billion ecological fund to tackle environmental problems, such as floods and drought, but much of that money cannot be accounted for. In a report by The Guardian, House of Representatives member Mark Gbillah reveals that a portion of the fund—specifically set aside for preventing and mitigating the impact of floods—was diverted through corrupt practices. With climate change intensifying and African countries already suffering the brunt of its effects, which are only expected to worsen regionwide—for example, rainfall across Nigeria was 20 percent more intense in 2022 than average, the World Weather Attribution concluded—it will be crucial to have resources like the ecological fund readily accessible.

Strategies for Food Security

Farmers are a vital part of a climate-resilient future—in the US and globally. The effects of climate change cannot be mitigated without innovation from farmers, yet a resounding theme shared by farmers is that they receive limited resources to support their agricultural efforts. Despite this, local farmers have started adopting proactive measures to combat the impacts of floods and drought and are using changing rainfall patterns as an opportunity to influence high-yield crop production and combat food scarcity. Strategies like dry farming, spate irrigation, floodplain agriculture, and inundation canals are low-investment and low-skill interventions that farmers are turning to.

Spate irrigation is a water-diversion and irrigation technique that uses gravity to distribute floodwater to farmland. Its helps manage destructive flash floods by diverting excess water downstream and allows farmlands to store that excess for use during dry spells. Floodplain agriculture allows floodwaters to deposit nutrient-rich sediment across a wide area. Generally flat land, floodplains are areas bordering a stream. Over time, floods deposit silt, sand, and organic materials in these areas, making the land extremely fertile. Lastly, inundation canals—used only during floods—are dug next to rivers and divert excess floodwater from them.

Agroforestry can reduce the impact of flooding on farmlands as the thick roots, trunks, and stalks of perennial plants reduce the speed and flow of storm runoff, allowing water to percolate into the soil and lessening erosion.

These methods do not require large amounts of external funding and can be easily implemented by farmers looking to protect their crops during floods and increase yields. They all utilize excess water and help to irrigate farmlands long after floods and rainy seasons have passed.

Climate Reality leader and agroforestry advocate, Deborah Elesie, believes that Nigeria will soon see rising poverty and unemployment as its agricultural sector suffers from climate impacts. However, she notes that agroforestry offers a way forward. Agroforestry is a general term for land-management systems where trees and other perennial plants are grown around crops and pastures. Climate-smart practices under the agroforestry umbrella include alley cropping, or planting trees alongside crops, and silvopasture, which integrates trees and livestock in a mutually beneficial way. Agroforestry can reduce the impact of flooding on farmlands as the thick roots, trunks, and stalks of perennial plants reduce the speed and flow of storm runoff, allowing the water to percolate into the soil and lessening erosion.

In one of the country’s most flood-impacted regions, farmers are also preparing for droughts. In Northern Nigeria’s Adamawa state, farmers are using a climate resiliency strategy called dryfarming. Instead of relying on artificial irrigation, this type of farming utilizes drought resistant crops, like cowpeas and rice, and helps such crops thrive during dry seasons by utilizing moisture that is already in the soil. Using this method, farmers “train” their crops to reduce their water loss, allowing the crops to thrive on little water.

Floodwaters can also be redirected to farming areas that have water shortages, notes Ibrahim Kabiru, national president of the All Farmers Association of Nigeria, in a Punch report. He also notes that farmers can use residual moisture through relay cropping, an agricultural management strategy that allows water left at the root of the first crop to be used by the second crop, maximizing crop production, particularly during dry seasons. However, these practices must become more widespread for Nigeria to fully tackle food scarcity.

Researchers are also working to develop climate-smart agriculture by tapping into the System of Crop Intensification, a climate-smart methodology aimed at resource conservation and increased crop yields. Some of these practices are already producing positive results. For example, in November 2022, after conducting a series of tests, the National Root Crop Research Institute helped grow and harvest a first batch of geoengineered potatoes that are immune to late blight fungus, which is caused by water mold—a common after-effect of flooding. In 2021, over 2000 farmers grew genetically engineered cowpea, the country’s staple legume. These engineered crops are one way researchers hope the country can reach food security.

According to Mongabay, as in Nigeria, agroforestry is growing in popularity in the US as the United States Department of Agriculture recently launched a Climate-Smart Commodities funding program aimed at investing over $60 million in farmers’ agroforestry efforts. Agroforestry can be adapted to various types of farms and ranches and is crucial for long-term sustainable agricultural production, according to the USDA. Considering the Western US’ drought and water scarcity issues, farmers can also turn to dry farming and residual moisture strategies to meet food demand amidst climate change. In the context of Nigeria’s changing climate, implementing flood mitigation strategies such as floodplain agriculture and spate irrigation will be key to maintaining agricultural production, surviving droughts, and lessening food insecurity not only for farmers but the entire country.

This article originally appeared in the Nonprofit Quarterly. See the original article here.

Many Arab Americans, like many members of all groups of people, are incredibly generous. Whether preparing food for a sick neighbor or responding to humanitarian crises in their ancestral homelands or the US, they are guided by formal and informal giving, a strong part of Arab American heritage. Perhaps the most well-known example of such Arab American generosity is Danny Thomas, a Lebanese American singer, actor, and philanthropist who founded St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital.

Over the last two decades, the philanthropic sector has committed resources to researching and strengthening giving in communities of color. However, the Arab American community has been largely left out of these efforts. The sector has conducted studies on giving in African American, Latinx, Asian American and Indigenous communities, but there has been no extensive research on Arab American philanthropy—until now.

The Center for Arab American Philanthropy, the nation’s only Arab American foundation, decided to fill this research gap. While CAAP conducted a report on Arab American giving in 2006, no subsequent studies were done until 2021-2022, when the foundation used online surveys and in-person focus groups to gather information on the topic. CAAP’s recently released report, A Tapestry of Giving, provides a snapshot of the giving attitudes, habits, motivations, and priorities of the study’s participants.

Conducting such research—and any research on Arab Americans—can be difficult due to a lack of demographic data; the US census identifies respondents with Middle Eastern and North African heritage as “white,” rendering Arab Americans invisible. Despite these challenges, CAAP was committed to examining and uplifting the long, proud history of Arab American philanthropy and discovering what motivates Arab American giving. Three hundred Arab Americans participated in CAAP’s recent research. Of them, more than 80 percent identified as immigrants or the children of immigrants. CAAP elaborates on five of the major themes that emerged from their responses.

Arab Americans connect with their Arab American identity through giving

Arab Americans have diverse national origins and faith backgrounds. Participants in CAAP’s study hailed from 12 different Arab countries, identified as Muslim, Christian, or with no religion, and supported various charitable causes. Yet, when asked what motivates their giving, many participants said that they give to causes that strengthen the Arab American community and support needs in their ancestral countries, such as Palestine, Syria, and Lebanon, where political and economic turmoil is causing humanitarian crises.

Participants see philanthropy as a powerful way for Arab Americans to tell their own stories about their contributions to American society and leave a legacy for future generations. “I choose organizations that reflect my ethnicity to show that immigrants have a positive impact on the nation,” one participant said. Notably, however, Arab Americans do not limit their giving to their own ethnic, national, or religious community. Almost 40 percent of respondents said they gave an equal amount to Arab American and non-Arab organizations.

Arab American giving is deeply personal

Survey respondents’ personal histories impacted their giving priorities, particularly in the areas of education, health, and refugee support, including emergency relief. Personal connections also play a critical role in how Arab Americans give. Family and friends often influence giving as participants seek input and recommendations from people they trust. Fifty-three percent of respondents were more likely to support an organization if their friends—rather than the organization—ask them to donate.

The importance of personal histories and relationships to Arab American giving should encourage philanthropic initiatives to build on the power of collective giving. One way that CAAP does this is through its 100 Arab American Women Who Care giving circle, which meets annually in the Detroit area and brings together socially conscious Arab Americans to pool their resources for a grant toward a local cause.

Arab American giving is driven by gratitude

Given the economic, political, and social turmoil roiling much of the Arab world, it may be unsurprising that respondents expressed a deep sense of gratitude, especially those who immigrated themselves or witnessed the sacrifices their parents and grandparents made for future generations. The result of such gratitude is a sense of duty to share their privilege. Eighty-six percent of survey respondents agreed with the statement: “It is my responsibility to support organizations through monetary donations.”

“I’ve had a really lucky life in a lot of ways,” one participant said. “I don’t live in poverty. I don’t live in a refugee camp. I’m tremendously thankful for that, and to have education and health care.” Across the board, respondents cited that their education played a pivotal part in enabling them to shape a better life for themselves, inspiring them to pay their own educational blessing forward by supporting scholarships.

Trust in organizations continues to be important for Arab Americans 

The crucial role of trust in guiding Arab American philanthropy should not be underestimated. This includes trust not only in an organization but its leadership. Eighty-two percent of study respondents consider an organization’s leadership when making decisions about giving, and 91 percent consider an organization’s reputation and/or review the organization’s charity rating before donating.

In CAAP’s initial research on Arab American giving in 2006, participants discussed the challenges of giving after the September 11 attacks, particularly their concerns about their giving being investigated under the Patriot Act. In a post-9/11 context of anticipated racial profiling and surveillance, trust in an organization became of paramount importance—and it remains so today.

Personal relationships, either with an organization’s leaders or with friends or family who recommend an organization, are key to that trust. Arab Americans also take time to review an organization’s management and ask critical questions about the organization’s impact and value. While participants indicated that they were more comfortable giving to Arab organizations now than in years past, some still expressed hesitancy around giving to Arab—particularly Palestinian—organizations for fear of political or professional repercussions.

How Arab American giving compares to other communities of color

In 2015, the Blackbaud Institute released a Diversity in Giving report, which looked at the giving trends of White people and communities of color (Asian, Black, and Hispanic, using the report’s terms) but did not include Arab Americans. However, current information indicates that Arab Americans are more likely than other communities surveyed in the Blackbaud report to support organizations engaged in direct service, including emergency relief efforts, local social service agencies, and immigrant rights.

Arab Americans in CAAP’s study are also more likely than other communities surveyed in the Diversity in Giving report to support youth development and educational organizations. Arab Americans are more likely than other communities to engage in volunteerism and advocacy and are more proactive about engaging their friends and family in their giving through email and social media, reinforcing the deeply personal nature of Arab American giving. Arab Americans who participated in CAAP’s study were far more likely than other communities to report that they have a responsibility to give.

As the only Arab American community foundation in the country, CAAP is a leader of and advocate for telling positive stories about Arab American giving to the broader philanthropic community. We hope that the research behind our report, A Tapestry of Giving, is just the beginning of richer conversations about the impact on and role of Arab American philanthropy in shaping our society.

With more research and greater awareness of Arab Americans giving, the philanthropic sector can better understand—and engage with—what motivates this passionate and generous group of philanthropists to give.

This article originally appeared in the Nonprofit Quarterly. See the original article here.

In a report published last year for Just Futures, an investment advisory firm that seeks to encourage “values-based investing,” Anand Jahi indicates that the amount of money invested on Wall Street totals $71.4 trillion (4)—nearly three times the value of the annual gross domestic product of the United States.

By comparison, the $75 million (33) that Jahi indicates is invested in social justice is roughly one millionth as much. Scale, in short, is a long way off. But the potential for scale is there. One sign of this is the rapid growth of what is variably called “socially responsible investment” or “impact investment.” In other words, hunger for investments that generate social benefit is widespread, even if many of the investment vehicles for getting there are flawed. In his report, Jahi aims to sets forth a clear definition of what a social justice investment ecosystem could look like and challenges nonprofits and philanthropy to shift their investment strategy.

But first: what is meant by “impact investing” anyway?

Impact Investing’s Muddled Definitions

As NPQ has covered, impact investing has many definitions. For his part, Jahi focuses on private-market investment—that is, investments that occur outside of the Wall Street system—and which have an explicit social benefit purpose. Because these investments are often done firm by firm, there is greater opportunity to hone in on a specific desired impact (such as supporting worker ownership and/or businesses owned by people of color). On the other hand, plenty of “public equity” (stock-based) funds also have “impact” in their name.

It is worth noting that, at the most basic level, every investment has impact, be it for better or worse—it does not matter if the only goal is to make money. But the phrase, “impact investing,” implies pursuing some positive social benefit.

The US SIF (Forum for Sustainable and Responsible Investment) has been tracking the socially responsible-investing field since 1995, a long time—and a dozen years before the term, impact investing, was invented. Every two years, US SIF releases their Trends report, most recently in December 2022 (reflecting 2021 figures).

When US SIF published their 2020 report (based on 2019 figures), they reported that $17.1 trillion of the then-$51.4 trillion in total assets managed by US investment firms were invested with some sort of impact criteria in mind, or as US SIF phrased it, with “sustainable investing strategies.” This is, to state the obvious, far greater than Jahi’s $75 million figure—and it speaks to the demand for socially beneficially investments, if not necessarily the reality of them. At the heart of the difference is that Jahi’s criteria demand direct community control of investment for socially beneficial purposes; by contrast, US SIF’s figure loosely measures so-called “sustainable investing strategies.”

Specially, US SIF counted in its $17.1-trillion figure any investment by firms that analyzed “ESG” factors when deciding where to invest funds and/or advocated for shareholder resolutions that seek some non-economic social benefit. The E of ESG stands for attention to the environment (that is, care in limiting resource use, pollution, carbon emissions, and so on). The S is for social (fair treatment for workers and related practices), and the G is for governance (this includes things like gender and racial diversity on company boards).

ESG is, at best, a weak form of impact investment: it is most often focused on avoiding the worst, rather than truly pursuing a positive social good. In part, this is because ESG funds are predicated on the notion that nothing will be sacrificed in terms of expected investment return.

In fact, it is easy to find investment bank articles, like this one from JP Morgan, which argue that ESG investing generates equal or greater profits than not taking ESG factors into account. This makes ESG investment easy to do—no need to sacrifice financial return. You can get rich and feel good at the same time! It also limits the impact your investment is likely to have because sometimes tradeoffs between social impact and financial return do exist. For example, unions often improve firms by increasing productivity and ensuring workers receive fair treatment on the job (something the “S” in ESG is supposed to value), but the higher wages workers earn at unionized firms frequently means lower profits and therefore lower earnings per shareholder. To be charitable, ESG lenses do an imperfect job of capturing such tradeoffs. For example, Apple Computer ranks high on ESG (low risk), even though iPhone production relies on low worker wages, which are enforced by Chinese police authorities.

Another example: as Jahi writes, “As it has come to be practiced by major firms like BlackRock and Morgan Stanley, ESG integration focuses on considering the impacts of the environmental, social, and governance practices of a given company on its long-term profitability” (21) Thus, if a firm routinely damages the environment (say, by drilling oil and increasing carbon emissions), but does marginally better than others in the sector, it might be considered environmentally acceptable. As Tom Lyon, a business professor at the University of Michigan explains, this is why a sustainability impact investing fund can include Exxon in its portfolio.

Indeed, if you dig even an inch, you will quickly see just how limited a tool ESG investment often is. It can be fun—or depressing, depending on your mood—to look at your favorite “impact” stock investment fund and see what stocks are included.

To pick one example, as of early 2023, the top 10 holdings of Domini’s “Equity impact Fund” are Apple, Microsoft, Google (Alphabet), Amazon, NVDIA, Tesla, Visa, Procter & Gamble, Home Depot, and Mastercard. A similar fund at Green Century shares much of the same lineup of companies, although sans Apple and Amazon. If you’re skeptical that buying stock in Google, Microsoft, and Tesla is going to change the world—well, you’re not wrong. To quote Jahi’s report again, “In practice, it is very difficult to both be rigorous about values-based screens and look for market-rate returns” (22).

Recalculating…

Even so, the figure reported by US SIF in 2020—that is, one out of every three dollars invested on the stock market employed at least a weak form of ESG screening— represented an astonishing number. At the time, somewhat incredulously, I titled my analysis of their report, “Impact Investing Is Ubiquitous, But Where’s the Impact?”

So, what do the most recent numbers say? In their 2022 report, the US SIF estimate of the size of the impact-investment field fell by more than 50 percent—from $17.1 trillion to $8.4 trillion, even as total invested assets increased by nearly 30 percent—from $51.4 trillion to $66.6 trillion.

Is ESG investing collapsing? Not at all. Rather, US SIF recognized that its earlier numbers were grossly overstated. As US SIF puts it, “the US SIF Foundation decided to modify its methodology for the 2022 report. In a departure from previous editions, this report does not include the AUM [assets under management] of investors who stated that they practice firmwide ESG integration but did not provide information on any specific ESG criteria they used.”

US SIF adds that their “modified methodology distinguishes between a firmwide reference to ESG integration and a fund-level ESG strategy.” Translation: before, if an investment firm mentioned “ESG,” the assets of all its funds, including those that did not use ESG factors to place capital, might be included. Now, only the assets of funds that mention a specific ESG strategy in their fund description are included. The result: the new number is not one in three dollars, but one in eight.

Of course, that is still real money: $8.4 trillion is equivalent to about one third of annual US gross domestic product. That is an impressive amount of investment capital that at least claims to be screened at some level to avoid environmental harm, support fair working conditions, and ensure good governance (including gender and racial diversity at the corporate boardroom table).

But there can be a danger in letting people believe that their investments are more socially beneficial than they are. Jahi cites a recent business survey that indicates that 63 percent of “Generation X” investors and 80 percent of millennial investors ask their investment advisors about ESG strategies (22).

Asset managers, Jahi reports, charge higher fees (an estimated 67 percent higher) for ESG products (22). Perhaps the ESG push does move corporations to be modestly more willing to accept government policies that promote action to address the climate crisis. Surely, some good does come of all this. Yet, at the same time, as Jahi puts it, investors are paying for investment products that often are “looking to maximize profit by appearing values-aligned” rather than being values aligned.

How many of these Generation X and millennial investors would be willing to accept real trade-offs in return for greater social impact? Surely, the numbers would not be as high as the large majorities cited above. But some likely would.

The reality is that we just don’t know because while some social justice funds accept investments, options to invest in such funds are very limited (particularly for so-called retail investors—this is, investors who are “unaccredited”—a phrase that, to simplify, refers to people whose non-real estate net worth is less than $1 million). Of course, there are exceptions, where investment by people of modest means is legally permissible, such as crowdfunding, direct public offerings, and co-ops. But help developing a social impact investment strategy that uses such instruments, be it by a nonprofit or individual, is hard to find.

Creating a Social Justice Investment Chain  

Though Jahi’s paper is written for a specific investment advisory firm, the principles behind it have broader application. Jahi’s paper builds on the concept of “social movement investing” as developed in a paper published by the Center for Economic Democracy a year ago, but he is less theoretical and more empirical in his focus.

If US SIF’s criteria for impact are very loose, Jahi’s are very strict. Jahi writes that a social impact fund must (32):

• Be deeply aligned with and led by social justice movements
• Invest in and build power with marginalized communities
• Support community-controlled enterprise
• Offer non-extractive terms (that is, below-market interest rates)
• Be accessible to ordinary people (that is, accept investments from retail investors)

Jahi identifies just 10 funds that meet these criteria—seven which are already funded and three in formation. By far, the largest of these is Seed Commons, a network of funds that support worker-cooperative development across the United States and which manages about $45 million in assets. The total value of assets managed by the seven funds that are up and running is just shy of $75 million. This number surely understates the extent of social justice investing, but at least no one would accuse Jahi of inflating the numbers.

According to Jahi, in a social justice investment chain, individuals would invest in social movement-led intermediaries. These intermediaries, in turn, would assess investment opportunities and place capital in community-owned firms that meet the criteria listed above. The Just Futures platform that is being developed—and which has gained the backing of Common Future and a half-dozen foundations (Kataly, Nathan Cummings, Jessie Smith Noyes, the San Francisco Foundation, the General Service Foundation of Aspen (CO), and the Fund for the City of New York)—is seeking to test a retirement investment product that would tap into the over $1 trillion (5) in nonprofit 403b accounts that is currently invested on Wall Street to radically increase the amount of capital available for solidarity-economy investing.

Jahi adds that to ensure community ownership and movement control, “Just Futures’ Investment Committee and Board of Directors will include direct representation from movement groups as part of the governance involved in Just Future’s commitment to at least 30 percent community and movement ownership” (43). Additional goals are envisioned. They include creating a “Social Justice Investment Note” product, which would allow investors to reduce risk by diversifying their holdings across the different investments held by the fund.

Will efforts such as Just Futures pan out? Jahi, in his report, identifies many risks, including federal laws and regulations that strictly limit how retirement assets may be invested and which may interfere with some of the firm’s goals. Nonetheless, the experiment—which speaks to a broad hunger for impact investment—will be interesting to watch.

In the meantime, if you work for a nonprofit and your nonprofit’s 403b includes a “social impact” fund investment option, it might be worthwhile to take a quick look under the hood and see where your money is invested.

This article originally appeared in the Nonprofit Quarterly. See the original article here.

The following is a transcript of the video above, from our webinar on “Remaking the Economy: Black Food Sovereignty, Community Stories.” View the full webinar here.

Demetrius Hunter: Groceries on Wheels is a program that is operated through our nonprofit. It was inspired by my father, who took a mule and cart full of produce from Johnston County, North Carolina, to Wake County. He rolled a meal [cart] to provide senior citizens in our neighborhood [with] produce. I worked with him and observed the food needs, the systems that were going out, the donations of foods from, say, grocery stores who wanted to get rid of their cakes, two-day-old or three-day-old dessert, or week-old, desserts. And when I saw that, I knew [it was] important to continue the work that my dad did. My dad was a forerunner. He used to pay for food stamps at that time to make sure that people were eating healthy—he also had a loan system.

These things are similar to what the Groceries on Wheels program is doing. We do have the EBT system. We just use the technology to provide the SNAP benefit to our customers. We also have a healthy benefit program, which a couple of insurance companies are operating out of right now—Blue Cross Blue Shield, Aetna, these type of insurance companies. They have a terminal where if you have an insurance card that has the healthy benefits plan, you can use that. So, we’re creating food sovereignty for our customers by ensuring that they are able to use their SNAP benefits cards, their healthy benefit cards from insurance companies. We also have our programs where we distribute out foods to local churches, to the YMCA, and places like that. We’ve expanded on the work that my father did in the late 1970s up until the late to the early 2000s, until he retired. That’s where we are, as far as food sovereignty and ensuring that people have the food that they need.

This article originally appeared in the Nonprofit Quarterly. See the original article here.