The African Climate Foundation (ACF) is the first African-led strategic climate change grantmaking foundation on the continent fully dedicated to working on climate and development. In less than two years ACF has issued over 80 grants, supporting work in 23 African countries. ACF has its operational base in South Africa, with teams working out of Kenya, Nigeria and Senegal supporting projects at the intersections of climate and development on the continent.

Through measurable data-led projects, High Tide Foundation focuses on climate mitigation, including reducing methane emissions which are responsible for more than 25 percent of global warming today. The Foundation joined other philanthropies to fund the Global Methane Hub which supports governments to achieve the Global Methane Pledge, to collectively reduce global emissions by at least 30% from 2020 levels, by 2030. High Tide also helped establish a team in Chile, to scale up cost-effective methane mitigation solutions across the energy, agricultural, and waste management sectors.

Compagnia di San Paolo Foundation promotes civil, cultural, and economic development in Italy. With the Sustainable Development Goals as its strategic compass, the Foundation aligned its work to three goals: Culture, People and Planet. To ensure the effective application of its funds, the Foundation also aligns its strategy with international and European policies. It encourages grantees to deepen their sustainability impact, offering tools to improve strategic and development planning. The Foundation also supports public administration and communities in Northwest Italy to achieve the 2030 decarbonisation targets.

The Open Society Foundation (OSF) advocates for democracy in 120+ countries, and issues 2,500+ grants annually. An evaluation of the impact of the climate crisis impact on its programmatic goals inspired OSF to restructure the organisation in 2021, creating four new global programmes – one of which focuses on climate justice. OSF seeks to foster climate just transitions by building a resilient society with more equitable access to resources and aims to amplify more Global South climate voices, globally.

The Friends Provident Foundation (FPF) is a British independent charity that uses its grants, investments, shareholder activism, communications, and collaborations to promote a fairer and more sustainable economy. In 2019, the Foundation published its Climate emergency declaration. FPF also signed the UK Funder Commitment on Climate Change and encourages other organisations to reflect on how their investments can help to address the climate crisis. Aside from its advocacy to promote a systemic shift away from fossil fuels, FPF also invests in a low-carbon economy.

The Alliance of Socio-Environmental Funds of the Global South was created in 2021 by bringing together independent and activist socio-environmental funds from nine Global South countries and regions. Its primary goals are to act on two issues faced by philanthropies and other donors working on the climate agenda: how to define a grantmaking strategy that responds to local priorities and is grounded in local knowledge, and how to disburse resources without a legal entity operating in the country.

Alana Institute works to honour children’s rights, through advocacy, litigation, and publications. Its Children and Nature Programme defends children’s rights to live in a healthy environment and to strengthen their bond with nature. To this end, Alana joined several nonprofits and political parties in filing seven lawsuits against the government, in the Brazilian Supreme Court. The Institute also drives climate advocacy through the production of fiction media and the establishment of multisectoral partnerships and centres children within climate conversations.

Islamic philanthropic foundation, Dompet Dhuafa, has supported more than 28 million people in Indonesia with funding, social capital development, and advocacy campaigns. Inspired by the Islamic Declaration on Climate Change – issued in 2021 along with other religious communities’ calls for greater governmental and individual commitment and action – the foundation now shares ideas about how Islamic donation instruments can be leveraged for climate interventions; focuses on disaster response measures in under-resourced communities; invests in providing information and capacity building; and actively engages the international climate agenda.

The Guangdong Harmony Community Foundation is based in the Pearl River Delta in Guangdong, China — one of the world’s most densely populated and urbanised regions. Its community development and climate mitigation initiatives include providing grants and developing public participation toolkits to strengthen basin governance of the highly polluted Pearl River; research on how communities perceive climate change – the results of which gained national media attention and inspired the development of a climate education toolkit; and supporting communities to identify climate risks and take action.

The Jordan River Foundation (JRF) focuses on community empowerment, child safety, and other socio-economic issues, with emphasis on women’s and children’s needs, and with an increasing focus on Syrian refugees. Sustainability goals have been present in several JRF interventions for many years, with the Foundation partnering to promote organic farming, and to mainstream gender in climate change efforts in Jordan, for example. More recently, climate action has spread across the Foundation’s programmes, with the team exploring ways to more explicitly link its work to the Sustainable Development Goals.

The Barrow Cadbury Trust, rooted in Quaker values of simplicity, truth, equality and peace, has a longstanding tradition of ethical investing, aligning with its Quaker-derived social value proposition. The trust has been involved in ethical investing since its beginning 103 years ago. Operating with a segregated portfolio for over 50 years,2 the trust maintains a transparent understanding of its investments, conducting quarterly reviews with periodic in-depth analyses. The evolution towards integrating climate-aligned investments in its portfolio occurred organically, driven not solely by climate change concerns but by a broader commitment to activism, reflecting an external shift in understanding and deepening awareness of the global emergency.

Following the founder’s death in 2012, this family foundation underwent a significant governance transition process that involved defining roles for the second generation of family board members and welcoming changes in external board members. Recognising the need for a revised investment policy statement, the board focused on family values, investment objectives and return expectations, identifying values such as audacity, honesty, collaboration, discretion and long-term contribution. This statement provided a framework for board members and their trusted financial advisor. As the foundation contemplated integrating the founder’s grandchildren, the catalyst for their climate awareness emerged. Jokin Aranzábal, a family board member overseeing strategy, financial planning and investments, raised crucial questions about the foundation’s appeal to the next generation and the alignment of its portfolio with their values. Concluding that changes were necessary, the board decided to revisit the foundation’s purpose and overall strategy, and to shift incrementally their investment strategy to be climate-aligned.

The Nordea-fonden board played a pivotal role in reshaping the investment strategy, starting with the formulation of the foundation’s core values. The establishment of ethical conduct as a fundamental value, crucial for public trust, guided the board’s governance vision. Committing to these values, the board embraced a defined strategic direction which, ultimately, sparked a change in the endowment investment strategy starting in 2017. This transformation was driven by a steadfast dedication to their ethical guidelines, underscoring Nordea-fonden’s commitment to responsible and principled financial management.

The Trottier Family Foundation (TFF) supports projects that aim to mitigate climate change and reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions while addressing socio-economic issues. It partners to provide solutions for reducing Canadian emissions by 80 per cent, by 2050, and reaching negative emissions by the end of the century. TFF divested from fossil fuels; increased its climate granting budget and capacity; and collaborates across sectors to generate financial support for climate action. It works to strengthen shareholder advocacy and encourages other funders to integrate climate into their investments.

The Community Foundations of Canada (CFC), a network of 200+ community foundations, builds partnerships and movements that help drive sustainable development. The organisation has taken various steps, including developing a climate action plan, to reduce 40 percent of its carbon emissions by 2024. Its Sustainability Committee reports on progress, produced a sustainable travel guide, and monitors organisational travel. CFC is now eager to share with its members the importance of accountability, collaboration, embedding climate action into strategic debates, and ensuring staff buy-in.

The Pan American Development Foundation (PADF), in Latin America and the Caribbean, addresses the needs of vulnerable populations, promotes sustainable livelihoods, and advances rights and justice, with climate considerations across these focus areas. Its climate action ranges from climate integration in its projects and measuring its carbon footprint, to financing nature-based solutions and supporting skills development within governments, to leverage data about climate vulnerabilities. PADF is a signatory to the NGO Climate Compact, a member of Climate Accountability in Development, and aims to be carbon-neutral by 2025.

The Avina Foundation (Fundación Avina) was founded in 1994 by Swiss entrepreneur Stephan Schmidheiny to contribute to sustainable development in Latin America. During three decades of work, the Foundation has donated USD 454 million in grants that supported over 10 000 initiatives led by local allies.

Arapyaú Institute’s Climate Programme drives cross-sector engagement, to create conditions for forestry-related sustainable businesses in Brazil to flourish. The Institute incubates transformative networks, mobilising diverse organisations to collaborate on sustainability. Incubated initiatives include a network that supports politicians and civil society leaders to incorporate sustainability into their agendas; and a coalition of 300+ private sector, academia, and civil society representatives who call for stronger leadership in a low-carbon economy. The interaction between data, science and democracy permeates everything that Arapyaú supports.

The Shehu Musa Yar’Adua Foundation was established in 1998 by the friends, family and associates of Shehu Yar’Adua – a politician and military leader who fought for democracy in Nigeria after its independence in the 1960s, and through the decades that followed. Sentenced to prison by the military in 1995, Shehu Yar’Adua died in captivity in 1997. The Foundation was created to honour his legacy by promoting national unity, good governance and social justice in Nigeria.

The Friends Provident Foundation (FPF) is a British independent charity that uses its grants, investments, shareholder activism, communications, and collaborations to promote a fairer and more sustainable economy. In 2019, the Foundation published its Climate emergency declaration. FPF also signed the UK Funder Commitment on Climate Change and encourages other organisations to reflect on how their investments can help to address the climate crisis. Aside from its advocacy to promote a systemic shift away from fossil fuels, FPF also invests in a low-carbon economy.

The Daniel and Nina Carasso Foundation is a Franco-Spanish family foundation that focuses on sustainable food and citizen art. Carasso’s commitment to the DivestInvest campaign guided its financial strategy for tackling the climate emergency. In 2021, it reported €24 million in investments, 56 percent of which was directed to low-carbon transition projects. The Foundation supports philanthropic climate coalitions, the #PhilanthopyForClimate movement, the Global Alliance for the Future of Food, and advocates for other philanthropies to respond to the climate crisis

The Friends Provident Foundation (FPF) is a British independent charity that uses its grants, investments, shareholder activism, communications, and collaborations to promote a fairer and more sustainable economy. In 2019, the Foundation published its Climate emergency declaration. FPF also signed the UK Funder Commitment on Climate Change and encourages other organisations to reflect on how their investments can help to address the climate crisis. Aside from its advocacy to promote a systemic shift away from fossil fuels, FPF also invests in a low-carbon economy.