Ford announces donation match, opening opportunities to join fight against COVID-19

The COVID-19 Donation Match programme is a combined effort between Ford Fund and Ford Motor Company Executive Chairman Bill Ford that will match $500,000 in donations to designated community organisations in the fight against COVID-19, raising a potential $1 million for groups battling the pandemic across the globe. In Vietnam, funds are being raised to support masks, hand sanitiser liquid, and food for underprivileged people in cities, by Ford Vietnam, non-profit organisation Live & Learn, and PIckup Vietnam Club (PVC).

Ford Fund is also launching the new Read and Record virtual volunteering project to create an online library of Ford employees reading children’s books for the 1.3 billion children and youth affected by school closures around the world.

“During trying times, Ford employees are used to being the boots on the ground – getting out, signing up, and pitching in to help make a difference,” said Mary Culler, president, Ford Motor Company Fund. “Even now, while many are sheltering in place at home, our employees are looking for ways to help. These two new programmes offer meaningful ways for employees to give back and join in the fight against COVID-19.”

Make a donation to make a difference

Through the COVID-19 Donation Match, Ford Fund is giving Ford employees, as well as their families and friends, an opportunity to make a donation to support nonprofits and other community organisations in their efforts to meet coronavirus-related needs in more than 20 countries around the world.

Managed by GlobalGiving, Ford’s longtime disaster relief and global grant-making partner, the programme aims to support community projects in locations that have both a significant level of emergency need and a substantial Ford employee presence. Projects focus on addressing hunger, shelter, and mobility needs, providing educational resources or delivering critical medical supplies and services to communities in need.

Here in Vietnam, Ford and Live and Learn, and its Ranger owners club joined to donate masks, hand sanitisers, and food for underprivileged people including poor students in remote regions and very poor people living by scavenging in Hanoi. The Ranger trunks of PVC club members will be transformed into mobile shelter boxes, ensuring the flexible and careful transportation and distribution of donation packages to these people. The donation granting will be implemented right after the social distancing order of the government is disengaged.

“The pandemic has changed our life and work and has impacted heavily the livelihoods of many people. As a company that always endeavours to hold meaningful corporate social responsibility activities, Ford Vietnam teams understand the essential role of our and other businesses in Vietnam in the current fight against COVID-19. These are important factors to revive the Vietnamese economy in general and support people to overcome the pandemic difficulties in particular,” said Pham Van Dung, managing director of Ford Vietnam.

Employees and others interested in donating can visit www.globalgiving.org/ford-covid-response to view a full list of participating countries as well as cities across the United States, and to learn more about community projects they can support. GlobalGiving will add new projects and additional details over the coming weeks, so employees are encouraged to check back often for updates.

Virtual volunteering

Ford Fund’s new HYPERLINK “Read and Record” virtual volunteering project invites Ford employees from around the world to record and submit videos of them reading a children’s book in their own language. The effort is designed to provide Ford employees a way to give back from the safety and comfort of their own homes and builds on Ford Fund's ongoing efforts to increase literacy and promote a love of reading.

The online library will be cataloged by language, and multilingual employees are encouraged to read in languages other than English. Ford Fund plans to share the library with philanthropic groups that serve children and families.

Ford Fund previously announced it is allocating more than $1.6 million in resources to help communities and local nonprofits throughout Southeast Michigan and across the United States address hunger, shelter and mobility needs related to COVID-19. Earlier this year, Ford Fund also worked with Ford of China to provide face masks and other protective gear needed during the initial breakout of the virus in China.

As Ford Fund concentrates on taking immediate action at the local level, Ford engineers, researchers, and suppliers are designing and manufacturing masks, respirators, ventilators, and other critical medical equipment and supplies for healthcare workers, first responders, and patients fighting COVID-19.