Waitrose customers, have helped raise £600,000 in the last 18 months to allow the retailer to extend the Waitrose Foundation scheme, which support South African fruit growers.
The project started last year in the SA citrus industry, as a trust to fund educational, social and healthcare projects for the fruit-supplying communities.
Avocados were incorporated earlier this year and grapes, apricots, nectarines, peaches and plums are next on the list and mangoes will be added in 2007.
Waitrose and its partners donate a proportion of their profits to the project and Waitrose md Steven Esom expects the amount donated to soon clear the £1m-a-year mark.
Customers have been extremely generous. "It's absolutely great how shoppers have got behind us," Esom told The Guardian. "We wanted to link our customers with the workers who produce the fruit they buy, to create a 'virtuous circle'.
"It's also important that the farmers see the money is being raised for the second year running and that the scheme is here to stay."
The cash raised so far has been put into 34 separate community initiatives, ranging from training centres for adult literacy, crèches and HIV/Aids counselling.
"The customer now clearly understands the link between the purchase made at counter and what goes back to the community."
