Highlights & Happenings

A recap of activities and recent events

UK Students Deliver Food, Supplies to Help Community

Foodprint on Wheels, a Ford COVID-19 College Challenge grant recipient, is using a Ford Transit to deliver essential supplies

Future Brew student volunteers are distributing food parcels to homeless shelters and low-income families.

DUNTON, England — Ford Fund's global entrepreneurship programme is redirecting funding to support communities during the COVID-19 pandemic.

The Ford College Community Challenge has awarded additional grants to UK student teams meeting urgent requirements for food, safety supplies and Personal Protective Equipment (PPE).

Working with its global partner Enactus, the Ford Fund has launched an offshoot programme called the COVID-19 College Challenge. It is supporting previous Ford College Community Challenge-winning teams to extend their services during the Coronavirus lockdown.

One of the teams receiving additional support is the University of Southampton's Future Brew, which is partnering with local supermarkets to create food parcels for delivery to homeless shelters and low-income families affected by the crisis.

Future Brew takes its name from the not-for-profit enterprise's use of waste bread to make beer, which it has sold at the university's campus bars. The enterprise also collects waste produce, such as fruit and vegetables, for distribution to a community shop and a local homeless shelter.

The University of Nottingham's Foodprint enterprise also redirects surplus food, which would otherwise go into landfill, to people experiencing food poverty in Nottingham. Goods that are not redistributed are sold at discounted prices to the local community from its grocery shop.

Foodprint on Wheels is using a Transit donated by the Ford Transit Owners Club to deliver essential supplies.

Thanks to the COVID-19 College Challenge, the service has now launched Foodprint on Wheels—using a Transit donated by the Ford Transit Owners Club - providing food, safety supplies and PPE to Nottinghamshire Hospice, which cares for patients with terminal and life-limiting illnesses.

The initiative has been well received by the hospice, which is facing a projected £150,000 shortfall in funding due to fundraising events being cancelled and the closure of its 10 charity shops.

Foodprint on Wheels is also making deliveries of food bundles to two retirement homes in the city.

Enactus Nottingham team leader Farah Ravat said, "Our Foodprint team would like to say a huge thank you to Ford Fund in supporting our project focused on alleviating the pressures key-workers are under during this difficult time. With Foodprint on Wheels, we will collect and deliver necessary supplies, such as PPE and food, to nurses at Nottinghamshire Hospice. We are grateful for Ford's generous contribution and look forward to working with them in delivering a successful and meaningful project."

Food parcels made up of surplus goods are going where they are needed most in Southampton.

And Enactus Southampton team leader Dimitris-Marios Stoidis told @FordOnline, "We are delighted to receive the Ford Fund Covid-19 College Challenge. This funding will help us provide weekly food packages to the most deprived families in the Southampton area and be the beginning of a system that can impact the lives of people across the country. Thank you for your trust and support during this difficult time, we are truly grateful."

A total of 14 Enactus teams from across the globe, including not-for-profit enterprises in North America, South America, Africa and Asia, have also been selected to receive grants through the Ford COVID-19 College Challenge.

The Ford College Community Challenge, known as Ford C3, is Ford Fund's signature Social Enterprise programme, and has worked since 2008 to provide support for university student social entrepreneurs as they work to build more sustainable communities. Over the past six years, Ford Fund has worked with Enactus to bring Ford C3 to Enactus students in 10 markets around the globe, supporting more than 2,500 students in launching 190 social enterprises that have had a positive social impact on over 200,000 people.