Finding greener funders

Melanie May

News

Apr 13, 2022

In the drive to become more environmentally friendly, charities are often advised to look at the green credentials of the organisations they work with – checking for example that print partners have ISO Certification for Environmental Management, and banks aren’t investing in fossil fuels, but what about when it comes to finding funding?

Organisations including the Environmental Funders Network and the Association of Charitable Foundations (ACF) provide useful information about green grants and other sources of funding. The former is a network of trusts, foundations, and individual donors supporting environmental causes through grants, with the mission of increasing both financial support for environmental causes and the effectiveness of environmental philanthropy.

There’s also the Funder Commitment on Climate Change, which launched in 2019 and is hosted by the ACF, and the International Philanthropy for Climate Commitment, hosted by WINGS. This calls on all foundations, regardless of their mission, status or geographic location to come together and signal their commitment to climate action. Over 500 foundations have signed up so far across the UK, France, Italy, Spain and Canada, and it links with national movements in these countries.

Here’s a closer look at the UK’s Funder Commitment on Climate Change.

The Funder Commitment on Climate Change

Signing the Commitment requires foundations to focus on making their own practices more environmentally friendly, and to be transparent about what they do in this regard.

Foundations that sign up make a number of commitments:

• To make opportunities for trustees, staff and stakeholders to learn more about the key causes and solutions of climate change.
• To commit resources to accelerate work that addresses the causes and impacts of climate change.
• To seek opportunities to contribute to a fair and lasting transition to a post carbon society, and to support adaptation to climate change impacts.
• To steward investments for a post-carbon future.
• To take action to decarbonise their own operations.
• To report annually on progress against the five goals listed above and continue to develop, learn from others, and share own learnings.

Josephine McCartney, Chief Executive, Kent Community Foundation says:

“Checking the green credentials of funders is an important element of a charity’s due diligence and has both ethical and reputational implications. If a foundation has signed the Funder Commitment on Climate Change it is a clear indication that they are taking climate change and their impact on it seriously.”

“The transparency of the Commitment is crucial in ensuring foundations who sign the Commitment are acting upon the urgency of the climate crisis. It also serves as a great resource for other trusts and foundations in imagining what different philanthropic action on climate looks like. The annual survey will enable foundations to better understand, gather and communicate the range of activities that signatories are undertaking, the difference that we are making together, and where additional support might be needed.”

In fact, over 90 foundations have signed the Commitment to date, including Esmée Fairbairn Foundation, Comic Relief, Power to Change, Kreitman Foundation, Kent Community Foundation, and Wolfson Foundation.

Richard Luck-Hille, Kreitman Foundation Trustee comments:

“We endorse any process that encourages funders to climatise their thinking and behaviour, not only those with a thematic focus in this area. We particularly appreciate the commitment to look holistically at the Foundation’s operations beyond grant making, especially in how and where we invest.”

For the Wolfson Foundation, Paul Ramsbottom, its Chief Executive, says:

“Being a signatory means we are committed to engaging with environmental sustainability across all of our activities, from our grant making through to taking steps to minimise the impact of our day-to-day operations.

“We recognise that the climate emergency impacts us all. While there is much more work to be done, signing the FCoCC was a recognition of the increasing importance of climate change to those we support, and a commitment to keep learning, communicating, investing and deploying our resources.”

So, what does it mean in practice? The Wolfson Foundation and Kent Community Foundation provide two examples.