Restoring wellbeing, building community, providing hope: The Afiyya Foundation's journey

For families experiencing hardship across Lye, Dudley borough and the wider West Midlands, timely support can make all the difference. That’s why we’re delighted that The Afiyya Foundation has officially become a registered charity, opening new opportunities to provide hope, dignity and practical help to local people.

About the Afiyya Foundation

The Afiyya Foundation provides food and hygiene parcels to residents and families who are experiencing poverty. Faisal, Kaliq and the team of volunteers there pride themselves on restoring people’s dignity and wellbeing, treating every referral they receive individually. “Afiyya” is an Arabic word meaning “health and wellbeing,” chosen to reflect the charity’s commitment to supporting the health, wellbeing, and dignity of individuals and families experiencing hardship.

When Faisal and Kaliq first approached us, their passion and commitment were immediately clear. They had a strong vision for supporting local people; what they needed was practical guidance, connections and support to navigate the charity registration process.

How we supported

Our first meeting took place during our Monday Morning Open Door session, where new groups can meet colleagues from across Dudley CVS and access a wide range of expertise. This helped us identify the best support for Afiyya Foundation, including guidance on charity registration and volunteer management.

While we can support with the general principles of being a charity, there’s no substitute for learning from similar charities too, so we arranged for a friends at Black Country Foodbank to have a chat with them. Black Country Foodbank helped The Afiyya Foundation to consider their referral pathways and eligibility criteria which we knew would be important for the Charity Commission to understand and assess (we are incredibly grateful to Jen at Black Country Foodbank for being so generous with her time, not only to support The Afiyya Foundation but also the likes of Brierley Hill Babybank and Kids Clothes Project – thanks Jen!). We also invited Afiyya Foundation to our Place-Based Networks and Welcome to the Sector sessions so that they could be more connected to the community and like-minded organisations.

Altogether we supported The Afiyya Foundation with:

Developing their constitution
Thinking about their plans
Finessing their charitable purposes
Applying to the Charity Commission (reviewing and making suggestions on multiple draft applications)
Responding to follow-up questions asked by the Charity Commission’s caseworker
Developing their volunteer-involving processes

And the team at the Afiyya Foundation took our support and ran with it! We’re so impressed by how well they worked together as a team, took on board suggestions, demonstrated a great understanding and articulated their work and commitment to supporting families experiencing hardship. We’re so pleased to have helped The Afiyya Foundation reach this milestone and looking forward to supporting them throughout their journey as a charity.

The last word

The last word, should go to The Afiyya Foundation itself, who shared a lovely post on its Facebook page:

We would also like to express our sincere thanks to Becky Pickin, John Goodman and Grace Kelley at Dudley Council for Voluntary Service (Dudley CVS). Your guidance, patience and expertise throughout this process have been incredible. Thank you for taking the time to support us and for helping turn this vision into a reality. We truly couldn’t have done it without you.

This recognition from the Charity Commission isn’t just a certificate—it’s an opportunity. An opportunity to reach more people, build stronger partnerships and continue serving our community with greater impact, transparency and trust.

If you think your organisation, or another organisation you work with, would be a good fit to become a referral partner with The Afiyya Foundation, the team would love to hear from you at partners@afiyya.org.uk.