Project Karinderya, implemented by the Jollibee Group Foundation and its partners, has helped re-establish 320 karinderyas and provided free meals to 6,400 families as of August 2021.

The community lockdowns and strict health and safety protocols have forced a lot of karinderya (local eatery) owners to close stores or suspend operations, which affected not only the livelihood of karinderya owners, but also threatened the source of affordable food for urban poor families, aggravating the hunger problem in the country.

To help both local eateries and families survive the effects of the pandemic, the Jollibee Group Foundation (JGF) worked with Kasagana-Ka Development Center Inc. (KDCI) and Kabuhayan sa Ganap na Kasarinlan Credit and Savings Cooperative (KCoop) in implementing Project Karinderya, resulting to the re-opening of 320 karinderyas from Metro Manila, Bulacan, Cavite, and Rizal.

Through Project Karinderya, the small eateries were given financial support and training to build their owners’ skills so that they could sustain their businesses. JGF leveraged on the Jollibee Group’s expertise on food management and taught karinderya owners about food preparation, food safety, and customer service.

On top of this support, Project Karinderya also provided the communities’ vulnerable families with food vouchers for 30 days. These vouchers could be used to purchase meals from participating karinderyas, ensuring that the karinderyas had regular customers while addressing hunger in their respective communities.

The project has served meals to 6,400 family beneficiaries, or approximately 32,000 individuals as of August 2021.

“Project Karinderya mitigated the impacts of the pandemic for severely affected urban poor families by giving them access to safe and nutritious meals. These small eateries were already in place in the communities, what we and our partners did was to revive and strengthen it – building up the capabilities of our karinderya benficiaries so that they don’t just survive during this pandemic, but are able to sustain their livelihoods beyond it,” said Gisela Tiongson, Jollibee Group Foundation’s Executive Director.

Back on their feet

During the project period, 100% of the participating karinderyas were able to recover their income.

Karinderya owners Joselito Filoteo from Meycauayan, Bulacan and Marissa Detoito from Barangay Lagro, Quezon City were among those who participated in the initiative. They were inspired to continue growing their businesses, with hopes of providing better living conditions for their families.

For her part, Detoito said, “Malaking tulong po ang Project Karinderya dahil mas tinangkilik po ang aming luto. At dahil dito ay nadagdagan po ang aming kita (Project Karinderya was a big help to us because more customers have enjoyed our food, thus adding more to our income).”

“Masaya po ako na marami rin akong natutunan tungkol sa wastong pagpapatakbo ng negosyo at promotion ng business. Malaking tulong po ito sa pagpapatuloy ng aking business (I’m glad I was able to learn a lot about the right way of managing and promoting a business. This is a big help as I continue to operate my business),” Filoteo added.

Project Karinderya was co-funded by Jollibee Group Foundation, KCoop and KDCI, Deutsche Investitions-und Entwicklungsgesellschaft (DEG) and Temasek Foundation of Singapore.