Support Great Coffee and Girls Gotta Run Foundation

Along with the introduction of the Bashasha Project, a series of coffees from Bashasha in the Agaro Zone of Western Ethiopia, we’d like to take the time to remind you about one of our great partnership programs with the Girls Gotta Run Foundation (GGRF).We believe in bringing more focus back to origin and we’re doing that by selling great coffees for a great cause.  

Why It Matters  

In Ethiopia, early marriage is the single most important force undermining a girl’s access to education across almost all regions of the country. Even though marrying girls under 18 is illegal according to national laws, it is still a widespread practice due to tradition, poverty and fear of violence.  

GGRF offers girls and their families an alternative to early marriage by providing athletic scholarships paired with a holistic, life-scale approach for vulnerable girls ages 11 to 18. Each scholarship helps a girl attend secondary school for a year. It also provides healthcare for her and her mother as well as meals, school books, tutoring and access to sanitary facilities. The program helps girls acquire important life skills such as family planning, financial literacy, nutrition, healthy relationships and more.  

This year, GGRF’s first class of Athletic scholars graduated from high school and passed their exams to enter University in the fall. Since only 10% of girls in Ethiopia complete 12th grade, this was a huge milestone achievement for the girls in the class and for GGRF’s programs. 

GGRF also impacts the lives of the mothers of girls receiving their scholarships. Mothers participate in entrepreneurship and financial literacy training and are given seed money to start a savings group together. Last year, the mother’s savings group in Bekoji opened the Mother’s Shop where they could sell their handmade items daily. This shop expands their sales opportunities from selling at the market, which only operated a few days a week, to daily, increasing their earning potential.  

How It Works  

A portion of each purchase of our Bashasha Project coffees gets donated to GGRF. You can also choose to make a larger donation to the program that we can add to your final contract for easy accounting. Consider calculating your donation in cents per single-origin espresso pulled or per bag of roasted coffee sold. The money we raise will go towards helping GGRF continue to fund their incredible programs and support them in their work to keep girls healthy and in school.