How did institutions supported by Futuro Bem Maior act during the pandemic?

With the pandemic, the third sector found itself facing enormous challenges: it was necessary to try to maintain the original activities, seek to meet the new demand for support and protect employees and volunteers, following guidance from medical authorities, to avoid contagion of the virus.

To understand the effect of the new reality within the entities, the Bem Maior Movement listened to civil society organizations and collectives supported, over the course of a year, by the second edition of Futuro Bem Maior, our program to strengthen community impact initiatives, started in second half of 2020.

Emergency support
In March, we held individual conversations with supported institutions, to better understand the effects of the second wave of Covid-19 in their regions.  The course of the scenario outlined in individual conversations led MBM to mobilize and allocate emergency support of R$300,000 to 25 organizations located in places most affected by the pandemic. .

Listening to organizations
Subsequently, as a way of better understanding the impact of support and how each institution dealt with the crisis, we carried out a survey between July 9th and 27th, with all organizations from the second edition of Futuro Bem Maior. These organizations are mostly located in the Northeast (18) and Southeast (13) regions, with an emphasis on health causes, senior citizens, education, income generation and accessibility.

One of the main points verified in the study was the massive involvement in actions to combat the pandemic and its effects, with organizations reporting that they had to help the community with health and food problems, in particular, the distribution of basic food baskets.

The effects of the pandemic
With the pandemic, 75.6% of projects confirmed that they needed to change the schedule and 81.1% said they had carried out unforeseen activities. An important piece of information that helps show the size of the change within the sector is the adaptation to the online format: 78.3% fully or partially agreed that they were able to adjust their work.

Naturally, those who promote solidarity actions tend to act with love and commitment. And, during this difficult period, the panorama did not change, more than half of the organizations classified the involvement of their members as “excellent”.

Regarding the support of the Greater Good Movement, all organizations responded that they felt an increase in motivation and strengthening of their activities. There was also unanimity when they were asked whether the resources helped them to have their work highlighted in the community. Furthermore, almost all (97.3%) stated that they had visibility to reach new partners.

There was no change in the number of people helped in eight institutions and the others started to help more people, despite the difficulties. The survey also showed that only two projects reduced the number of direct beneficiaries. In general, most entities remained with the same staff or had a reduction in volunteering, due to the change in scope from face-to-face meetings to operating in the online environment.

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The MBM's Futuro Bem Maiorr program was created in 2019 with the aim of strengthening community impact initiatives through institutional and financial support, encouraging the protagonism of social organizations and collectives in vulnerable communities and the socioeconomic development of the territories where they operate.

And speaking of the notice, registration for the 3rd Futuro Bem Maior program is open until September 27th . We will select 30 social organizations and/or collectives to participate in our program to strengthen community impact initiatives. For more information, visit the notice page and participate!

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Images: Transforma Brasil, Instituto Phi and Movimento Bem Maior