Donate to #FilipinosFeedtheFrontlines to help restaurants and health care workers

A number of San Francisco Bay Area restaurants serving Filipino food, or Filipino-inspired dishes, opened up in recent months hoping to ride the wave of the emerging popularity of Filipino cuisine.

Then the coronavirus hit US shores and suddenly, those new restaurants found themselves in trouble. Opening a restaurant is a risky venture to begin with but when the isolate-in-place mandates took hold the restaurants took a massive hit, according to a survey by Kultivate Labs, a San Francisco-based Filipino American business incubator and arts organization. 

The survey conducted by the nonprofit found that more than half of the Filipino restaurants it works with have suffered a 90 percent drop in revenue, according to Desi Danganan, Kultivate Labs' executive director.

That drop in business was one of the main inspirations for Kultivate to launch Filipinos Feed the Frontlines, a fundraising initiative with the goal of raising $100,000 to pay struggling Filipino restaurants to provide 10,000 free meals to local hospitals and vulnerable people in predominantly Filipino neighborhood in the South of Market which includes the Filipino Cultural Heritage District.

The concept is simple: Out of the pool of funds, at about $10 a meal, restaurants prepare meals for health care workers and community members in the SoMa neighborhood who have lost their income source, elderly who can't fend for themselves and others. Its a win-win for the hospital workers and for the struggling restaurant owners.

A portion of the pool will be distributed by local nonprofits to bring food to vulnerable people in the SoMa neighborhood, where a large number of low-income and elder Filipino Americans with limited income live — though Danganan stresses that the meals will go to anyone who needs them, not just Filipinos.

However, in the six Bay Area hospitals receiving funds, a good portion of the workers receiving the meals are Filipino. In California, 20% of the nurses are of Filipino descent. At one hospital, Seton Medical Center in Daly City, 60% of the nursing staff are Filipinos.

The program draws on the Filipino value of kapwa. As defined by the father of modern Filipino psychology, Virgilio Enriquez, kapwa means “shared identity,” “equality,” and “being with others.” To put it simply, kapwa is the deep empathy individuals have towards fellow human beings.
The nine San Francisco Bay Area businesses currently providing meals through Filipinos Feed the Frontlines include: Nick’s on Grand, Señor Sisig, Lumpia Company, Sarap Shop, Mestiza and Little Skillet, FK Frozen Custard, Manila Bowl, SF Chickenbox/IVSF Catering, and the pop-up Ox and Tiger. 

As of Tuesday (April 15) morning, almost $33,000 has been collected towards the $100,000 goal. For more information on Filipinos Feed the Frontlines, or to donate, link here..

Big thanks to @OneDownMedia for these powerful videos to support #FilipinosFeedTheFrontlines.