GT Foundation Supports Vegetables Farming: Partners with Advancement for Rural Kids (A.R.K.) through a 1 Million Donation

Written by Laarnie Luna on August 4, 2020. Posted in Grants, Media, News, Press Release

GT Foundation, Inc. (GTFI) donated PhP1 million to Advancement for Rural Kids (ARK) for their project Feed Back—a vegetable farming program during this time of pandemic aimed at stemming hunger, keeping families healthy and together, and making communities achieve food security and resiliency. The donation will particularly benefit 416 families from the farming and fishing communities located in barangay Bogtong, Busuanga, Palawan; barangay Borac, Coron, Palawan; and barangay Traciano, Dumarao, Capiz. A virtual ceremonial signing of the Pledge of Donation was held on July 24 led by GTFI executive director and Metrobank Foundation president Aniceto Sobrepeña, ARK CEO Ayesha Vera-Yu; ARK trustee Philip Soliven; and GTFI assistant executive director Nicanor Torres, Jr.

“I am very thankful that GT Foundation partnered with us on this. Thank you for wanting to make sure that our kapwa (co) farmers, kapwa fisher folks, kapwa Filipinos are not going hungry and that they are securing their health particularly at this time of the pandemic,” said Vera-Yu.

In a span of 12 weeks, Feed Back will distribute vegetable baskets to participating farmers and fisher folks enabling them of three meals for a family of four. To ensure sustainability, the program’s next phase aims to empower the communities to grow their own produce for their household consumption at the same time create opportunities for them to earn a living by selling their excess produce to neighboring villages and towns. This will secure a family’s food, good health and enable them to participate in a secondary market.

“We have been praying that we get involved in agriculture and school-nutrition. The fact that we needed to do something to help our rural farmers and fisher folks to have something to eat during lockdown is a very important subject. Allow us to be able to do something in the areas that we would have wanted to move into,” said Sobrepeña.

The donation is part of over a PhP220 million contribution by Metrobank and GT Capital Holdings Group to fund and support efforts to combat the pandemic and help those in need. The amount was allocated for the purchase of personal protective equipment (PPEs) to benefit healthcare and security frontliners; “Project Ugnayan” led by the Philippine Disaster Resilience Foundation; distribution of meals and food packs to underprivileged families; construction and equipping of molecular laboratories for the testing of cases in partnership with the Department of Health, Philippine Red Cross, and Ayala Group; and Go Negosyo’s Project ARK (Antibody Rapid test Kits) of the Philippine Center for Entrepreneurship Foundation. Just recently, Toyota Motor Philippines Corporation donated 30 units of Toyota Vios to DOH for the mobility of healthcare frontliners and local government hospitals.