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Keeping Our Promise In A Pandemic

GlobalGiving’s CEO is counting on a wave of kindness to help nonprofits make it through the COVID-19 pandemic. Learn more about what our community is facing and doing in his update.


 

In Brazil, Mark is setting up a makeshift infirmary where refugees and others without a home can quarantine if they get COVID-19.

In Moldova, Liliana is starting an online marketplace, so farmers in the countryside can sell their produce to people grappling with food shortages in Chisinau.

In the United States, Mervyn is buying baby formula for families who can’t afford it because COVID-19 left them with no income.

Mark, Liliana, and Mervyn are responding to new challenges posed by COVID-19 in part with help from GlobalGiving. I am proud to share that GlobalGiving has awarded $1,000 microgrants to nearly 100 nonprofits in our community facing hardship—with more to come.

This is just one small part of a promise I made a few weeks ago to you—our resilient community of nonprofits, companies, and donors—to roll up our sleeves in service of heroes like Carrie, Liliana, and Fiorella. They need unrestricted grants, flexibility, and trust from funders—now more than ever.

At the bottom of my note, you can find a list of nonprofit partners who’ve been awarded $1,000 GlobalGiving hardship microgrants. But this represents a woefully small slice of those in need. More than 900 nonprofits in our community applied for these desperately needed funds. The pandemic is hitting heroes in the social sector especially hard.

On shoestring budgets, they’re struggling to get the technology they need to operate virtually. They’re devastated by lost revenue from canceled fundraising events. They’re worried about how they keep staff on the payroll. And many must operate and keep others safe in environments where social distancing is impossible: refugee camps, orphanages, and group homes like the one Mark runs.

To acknowledge the strain COVID-19 is placing on our community, we’ve published new resources in our Learn Library, updated our Peer Learning Network schedule, and added flexibility to our policies. In particular, we are:

  • Giving a 30-day project report extension to all partners and similar flexibility to our grantees. We want to be a source of relief, not stress, during this challenging time.
  • Allowing project-specific funding to be used for general operations through June 30, 2020. This small action will give our partners maximum flexibility to respond to the crisis. They know what their communities need right now better than anyone else. They just need freedom to do it.

We will continue to look for ways to lighten the burden and open pathways during this pivotal moment in time, and we invite you to join us.

If you have the means, please consider making a donation to GlobalGiving’s Coronavirus Relief Fund. Your gift will go to heroes at the heart of the crisis. Many are risking their lives to protect the most vulnerable people from the pandemic.

You can also keep our COVID-19 Hardship Microgrants Initiative going with a donation. The need is overwhelming, and every dollar raised will help a nonprofit keep serving others in this economically perilous time.

We need more bold actions from inspirational leaders like Spanx Founder Sara Blakely. She launched the Red Backpack Fund in partnership with GlobalGiving. Through the fund, GlobalGiving will make at least 1,000 additional grants of $5,000 each to female entrepreneurs in the United States who are impacted by the coronavirus crisis. I think this is the beginning of a wave of global kindness and generosity that will carry us through this catastrophe.

With more help, we could give every nonprofit in our community who applied for a hardship microgrant $1,000 to help them weather the pandemic.

Janet, a GlobalGiving partner who already received a microgrant to keep running an animal conservation center in South Africa, told us about the difference it made: “Our grant of $1,000 is simply a miracle, and it will help us tremendously. In particular, we will be able to help our workers to still support their families with food, and we will also be able to continue to pay salaries for our security guards. It is critically important that they help us to ensure our precious wildlife remains safe.”

I know you are also struggling with your own hardships in this moment; this pandemic has changed life for all of us. In this environment, any simple act of kindness—such as sharing this note with your friends and family on social media—is powerful and appreciated.

What we do now will determine the fate of the social sector, which forms an indispensable force in the movement to defeat COVID-19. If we turn our backs, countless nonprofit organizations might never recover.

A recent donor to our Coronavirus Relief Fund said it better than I could: “The world is tied together. The minute you realize this it makes sense to do your part in helping it stay together. Therein lies our most fundamental purpose.”

In solidarity,

Alix Guerrier
GlobalGiving CEO


 

GlobalGiving Hardship Microgrant Recipients

 

ADS Rifugio Isola del Sole | Italy
AdvocAid | Sierra Leone
Afghanistan Women’s Chamber of Commerce and Industry | Afghanistan
Akcioni per Nena dhe Femije | Kosovo
American Friends of the Spafford Children’s Center | United States
Another Hope Children’s Ministries | Uganda
Associação Latin American Sea Turtles | Costa Rica
Associação Crescimento Limpo | Brazil
AusCam Freedom Project | Australia
Autismo en Voz Alta | Venezuela
Awamaki | Peru
Backstage Chats Foundation | United States
Be Enriched | United Kingdom
Beyond Borders | United States
Cambodian Rural Development Team | Cambodia
Casa Hogar de Cabo San Lucas A.C. | Mexico
Center for Amazon Community Ecology | United States
Center for Conflict Resolution | United States
Charity Fund Helping People with Severe Diseases with You | Russia
Chattering Children | United States
COHESU | Kenya
Collinsville Food Pantry | United States
Common Hope | United States
Compartiendo Nuestras Bendiciones ONG | Guatemala
Concordia Welfare and Education Foundation | Hong Kong
Crea Comunidades de Emprendedores Sociales, A.C. | Mexico
Dharamsala Animal Rescue | United States
EcoVisio’ Public Association | Moldova
Education Through Music-Los Angeles (ETM-LA, Inc.) | United States
Environmental Protection in the Caribbean | United States
Fair Haven, Inc. | United States
Family Connection Foundation | Thailand
Forum for African Women Educationalists | Zimbabwe
Foundation Phuket Has Been Good to Us | Thailand
Free Minds Book Club and Writing Workshop | United States
Friends of Warm Hearth, Inc. | United States
Fruit Tree Planting Foundation | United States
Fundación Calicanto | Panama
Fundación de Beneficencia Hogar de Cristo | Chile
Fundación Fraternidad sin Fronteras IAP | Mexico
Fundación Gramo Danse | Panama
Fundación Ninos de los Andes | Colombia
Fundación Rutas Naturbanas | Costa Rica
Global Relief Association for Crises & Emergencies, Inc. | United States
Good Kenyan Foundation | Kenya
Greene Lamp | United States
Halt Poverty | Madagascar
HOPE (Horses Offering People Enrichment) | United States
Horn of Africa Development Initiative – HODI | Kenya
IkamvaYouth | South Africa
Infinite Family | South Africa
Jovenes de Puerto Rico en Riesgo, Inc. | Puerto Rico
Limitless Horizons IXIL | Guatemala
Lutheran Social Services of the Virgin Islands Inc. | Virgin Islands
Marpha Foundation | Nepal
Mentor Orphans Africa | Uganda
Moya Trust | Eswatini
Olalo of Hope – Kenya | United States
Organismo de Nutricion Infantil, A.C. | Mexico
PARTI Program | United States
Prithipura Communities | Sri Lanka
PROJECT MATHEW 2335 | Uganda
Puerta Abierta IAP | Mexico
Railway Children | United Kingdom
Rainbow Trust Children’s Charity | United Kingdom
Redress Limited | Hong Kong
Refugee Rights Europe | United Kingdom
ROCKIES ORGANISATION | Uganda
Rosie May Foundation | United Kingdom
Sadaka-Reut Arab Jewish Youth Partnership | Israel
Save the Deaf and Endangered Language Initiative | Nigeria
Seeds for Growth Foundation | Netherlands
Senitizo | United States
SHARP Digital | South Africa
Shoulder to Shoulder, Inc. | United States
Springs of Hope Foundation | United States
Suni-Ridge Sand Forest Park Environmental Rehabilitation Centre | South Africa
Sustinere | Canada
Terre Des Hommes Netherlands | Netherlands
The Andean Alliance for Sustainable Development | United States
The Delia Foundation | United States
The Firecracker Foundation | United States
The Other Side Foundation | Zambia
The School Garden Doctor | United States
The Sojourner Foundation | Barbados
Tigers4Ever | United Kingdom
Tikondane Community Centre | Zambia
Time of Peace Foundation | Colombia
TLC Ministries | South Africa
Transicion a la Vida | Panama
United Planning Organization | United States
UpRoot Colorado | United States
yourSanctuary | United Kingdom
Youth Potential South Africa – YOUPSA | South Africa
Zajecarska inicijativa | Serbia

Additional hardship microgrants have been distributed since this publication. Learn more.

Make a gift to GlobalGiving’s COVID-19 Hardship Microgrants Initiative. Your donation will help a nonprofit in our community make it through the crisis.

DONATE NOW

Featured Photo: Common Hope, a nonprofit that serves youth in Guatemala, received a COVID-19 hardship microgrant from GlobalGiving. Portrait of mom and daughter by Common Hope.

 

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