Being Black in the UK by Bakita Kasadha

We worked with the talented Black writer Bakita Kasadha to produce a spoken word style video with our colleagues, using poetry she wrote for us. The poem is a very honest account of the realities, including the highs and lows, of being Black in Britain and growing up Black in Britain.

Bakita Kasadha is a poet, health writer and health researcher based in the UK. She has shared her poetry internationally and performed at Latitude Festival. She uses her creativity as advocacy, exploring the tensions between identities and social constructs. Bakita has also recently contributed to two books: More Than Talk: Perspectives of Black and People of Colour (BPOC) working in Sexual and Reproductive Health (SRH) in the United Kingdom (UK) and Hairvolution.

Improving our African and Caribbean product offering

As a major food retailer, Sainsbury’s is working to make sure our ranges reflect local communities. To improve our offering for African and Caribbean customers, over 50 new products are being added into store from March next year, ranging from snacks and drinks to condiments and spices. Our Future Brands team will work with smaller Black suppliers, providing mentoring, advice and guidance at critical stages as they grow, to get them supermarket ready. In June, we launched new ranges of Health and Beauty products, such as the Dr Shea skincare range.

Celebrating food

For a second year in a row, we are also working with Wilfred Emmanuel Jones, more commonly known as the Black Farmer, selling his Jerk Sausages in selected stores and sharing his authentic recipe online. You can also find Sainsbury's Ackee and Jackfruit Ital Bowl to try, a vegan twist on Jamaica’s national dish of Ackee and Saltfish.

Supporting colleagues

This Black History Month for our colleagues across all our brands, we are focusing on four key themes, around celebrating African and Caribbean food, exploring Black owned businesses, celebrating Afro-textured hair, and supporting the Black community.

We are also celebrating the brilliant work that's happened through the commitment of many teams and the I AM ME Network (our Ethnically Diverse colleague network) over the past 12 months.

Examples of this are:

• 1,400 Senior Leaders completed ‘Let’s talk About Race’ training, helping them talk confidently about race and ethnicity, understand the experiences of our Ethnically Diverse colleagues, and creating a foundation for change.
• We tripled our investment in a development programme for ethnically diverse colleagues, which 250 colleagues joined last year.
• We joined the Black British Network to help improve inclusivity and representation across the business.
• We’ve set ourselves new Black, ethnically diverse and gender targets for 2024 to improve diversity in senior roles.
• We’ve adopted The Halo Code, the UK’s first Black hair code which protects employees who come to work with natural hair and hairstyles associated with their racial, ethnic, and cultural identities. We want to ensure Black colleagues can be themselves without fear of judgement or discrimination which is why we have updated our dress code policies to embrace afro-textured hair.

Get involved: Ways to mark and celebrate Black History month

There's lots of ways to celebrate and mark Black History Month, here's just a few ideas of things you can do:

• Spend time learning about Black history and influential Black people from Briton and around the world.
• Through literature – look out for our stores where we will be shining the spotlight on a range of books by Black authors, in support of Black History Month with a portion of profits going to the Sickle Cell Society.
• Support a Black-owned business - support ethnic minority entrepreneurs and businesses and fight systematic racism buy building a better economy for all.
• Through food – why not spice up an evening meal for friends or family and cook up the jerk sausages and sweet potato recipe by Wilfred Emmanuel-Jones himself.
• Through entertainment – from music to films and TV shows. Dedicate an evening on the sofa to celebrate and enjoy the best of Black entertainment.
• Donate or volunteer your time to charities that support anti-racism and equality.