Our programs
Leadership Development Initiative
Acacia Global’s primary focus is on its Leadership Development Initiative. Working closely with longtime collaborators Vuyiseka Dubula, founder of the Activist Education and Development Centre (AEDC), and Mandla Majola, founder of the Movement for Change and Social Justice (MCSJ), Acacia Global supports their efforts to increase access to education for women and to reduce the rates of gender-based violence.
AEDC was founded by activists with a goal of improving the economic and social status of community leaders and people living with HIV/AIDS. They accomplish this by providing support to women and increasing learning opportunities and access to higher education.
MCSJ educates community members and identifies and trains talented activists and leaders to address some of the most challenging issues in the townships: gender-based violence, crime, health, and safety.
In 2018, Acacia Global made a three-year commitment of $50,000 a year to support the critical work of AEDC and MCSJ. This represents 54% of our programmatic efforts.
Community Gardens
Acacia Global partners with food justice advocates to create and maintain community gardens. The John Pama Garden provides vegetables to the volunteers and workers who tend its crops, and to the students at the John Pama Primary School. Similarly, the garden at Lehlohonolo Primary School is the source of healthy lunches, with spinach, cabbage, butternut, beetroot, carrots, and tomatoes grown onsite. Acacia Global designates 12% of its funding for gardens.
Emergency Food Aid
Acacia Global honors its roots in the food and nutrition space by providing families with monthly food parcels. The people who receive our food aid live with diseases like HIV/AIDS and cancer, are seniors, or are members of the community who care for orphans and vulnerable children. Acacia Global’s Food Aid Program reduces hunger and malnutrition and helps people thrive. We devote 9% of our resources to this program.
Acacia Global is grateful for the funding it has received through the Open Arms International Legacy Fund for its Community Gardens and Food Aid Programs.
Education and Mentors
Acacia Global provides financial assistance to a select group of highly motivated students whose education was stalled because they lacked the money to go to school. In addition to receiving financial aid for school fees and transportation, some students are paired with a mentor—a successful woman from the townships—to receive ongoing psycho-social support. Acacia Global devotes 16% of its funding to these efforts, but this will decline over time as we focus educational efforts through our Leadership Development Initiative.
Artists
Acacia Global has had a long relationship with Monkeybiz, a Cape Town-based organization that employs talented women and men who create spectacular works of beaded art. Over the years, we also have met talented artists at their studios and on the streets. Acacia Global purchases original works of art and introduces the artists, and their work, to our supporters in the U.S. By supporting these organizations and individual artists, we help keep them employed, meaning the artists can put food on their table, send their kids to school, and improve their quality of life. Approximately 9% of our programmatic budget is designated for our work with artists.
Because the needs in the communities where we work far exceed our ability to address them,
Acacia Global does not accept unsolicited requests for support.