Environmental issues are inseparable from social challenges. Liz Gadd shares how non-environmental funders can play a vital role by integrating environmental considerations into their work.
What did we learn and enjoy from our first reading week? Here are eight recommendations to read, watch and listen to.
Environmental issues are inseparable from social challenges. Liz Gadd shares how non-environmental funders can play a vital role by integrating environmental considerations into their work.
We are thrilled to announce Nick Gardner as our new Executive Director.
Explore the UK Overseas Territories Fund and our latest report which shows the successes of the fund so far and why funders should get involved.
A report from the third of four events in our funder learning series about the UK Overseas Territories (UKOTs), focusing on innovative approaches to financing vital conservation and restoration work.
Oscar Brennecke-Dunn, our Events Coordinator, shares his reflections on our one-day conference that brought funders and fundraisers together to discuss how we can make environmental philanthropy work more effectively for everyone.
Sophia Cooke, co-author of our latest report, Increasing the effectiveness of environmental funder-fundraiser relationships, shares why we’ve researched this intersection, what we learnt and key takeaways for funders.
The UK Overseas Territories (UKOTs) are at the forefront of the world’s biodiversity and climate crises. Yet many UK environmental funders are not aware of the UK's responsibility for them, or that they host 94% of the nation’s biodiversity.
Where the Green Grants Went 9 reveals that environmental grants from UK-based foundations have almost tripled since our last report in 2021 Yet, the report highlights worrying trends in environmental philanthropy that need addressing for the sector as a whole to maximise its potential.
Tom Brookes updates his 'Ten – reflections on a decade in the climate community' from June 2019, which shared key lessons on joining the climate movement. Now five years further on, Tom looks back on what he wrote and presents us with a revised and powerful: 14 reflections on 15 years in the climate community.
Inspired by our new UKOTs learning series, this piece explores some of the UK's most biodiverse regions, why we need to protect them, and how funders can get involved.
Jack Durant, the Co-Founder & Co-Director of Youngwilders, shares how funders and EFN stepped up to help their youth-led organisation in its early days by providing much more than financial support and helping them grow more effectively.
Shishir Malhotra, the Impact Investment Director for Treebeard Trust, joins us to demystify impact investing. He shares his personal story of how he got into investing, explains why it can work alongside philanthropy, offers some tips for beginners and explains why the free Environmental Impact Investing Group (EIIG) can help.
Alex Jacobs, Executive Director of the Joffe Trust, reveals the truth about illicit finance, how it funds anti-environment forces and why funders can both help stop dirty money and accelerate a just climate transition around the world.
Kat Jones from Action to Protect Rural Scotland raises awareness of Scotland's new planning system, National Planning Framework 4, and how it could better address the environmental and nature crises.
This #InternationalWomensDay, we wanted to spotlight this incredibly important intersection: how gender-based violence affects environmental action.
CEO of Pilotlight, Ed Mayo, shares findings from their new research, 'The organisational needs of charities and social enterprises in the UK working on climate and sustainability'. Learning from a survey of 298 organisations, Ed proposes that funding organisations rather than projects is key.
Following a decision by staff and trustees, in late 2023, we closed our business bank account with HSBC after reporting showed that they are still heavily financing fossil fuels. This blog shares our decision, the full letter and further resources for those interested in greening their finances as well.
Climate Emergency UK have recently published the first-ever UK-wide assessment of local government climate action: the Council Climate Action Scorecards. The results? Not good! Annie Pickering from Climate Emergency UK shares the barriers to local climate action and why funders can help spark real progress.
Climate change and the destruction of entire ecosystems attract most of our attention. But we face another environmental threat - one which is insidious and fast-growing: light pollution.
Marie-Amélie Viatte discusses the need for a food revolution and how deliberate investment into regenerative urban food growing can be the catalyst for change we’ve been looking for.
Being a good environmental fundraiser goes beyond simply securing funds. In this blog, Natasha Ratter, explores core qualities of being a good environmental fundraiser and illustrates the importance of finding your voice, understanding your role in the bigger picture, prioritising relationships and wellbeing, and joining a supportive community.
Why is it that campaign groups and funders are neglecting consumption, a fundamental driver of environmental harm? Libby Peake explores why this is, the significant impact overconsumption has on greenhouse gas emissions and biodiversity loss and why we must turn our attention to it.
Last December, we attended COP15, the United Nations Biodiversity Conference in Montreal, together with many other young people of our network. This was not the first summit where youth was represented. However, our voices were never as strong as at COP15, where the Post-2020 Global Biodiversity Framework (GBF) was decided on.
Nani Jansen Reventlow’s keynote talk during our annual retreat for funders this year was titled ‘Harnessing the law for climate justice.’ Nani laid out what long-term funding in strategic litigation can achieve and how to use it as a tool for climate justice.
Whatever the scale, and wherever the location, most of our funding could be better spent if we ensure the work being proposed is based on reliable evidence, whether that be from academia or from centuries of local understanding. Funders can be instrumental in encouraging applicants to check and use available evidence for their work.
COP15 set a course for nations to significantly step up their actions to halt the loss of biodiversity. But will the new ‘plan of action’ for nature adopted at COP15 – termed the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework – succeed? Catherine shares her reflections and the 'reasons to be cheerful', despite the challenges left unresolved.
To truly address the impact of the climate crisis, funding must be anti-racist and address social injustice. In this blog, Nani Jansen Reventlow sets out five ways to become a better climate justice funder.
Why is 'new economy' work relevant to environmental philanthropy? Reflections on how can funders support work to redesign the economic system to be life-supporting, not life-eroding.
Insights from our new sector survey show that there is a vital role for philanthropic funding in recognising the importance of environmental action and giving it the stability needed to really make a difference.
As the largest funder of community activity in the UK, The National Lottery Community Fund plays a critical role supporting communities to unleash their energy and potential, especially on the climate and environmental emergencies. John Rose discusses the work the National Lottery Community Fund is doing to take environmental action and support grant holders.
Katy Scholfield shares how the Arcus Foundation's Great Apes and Gibbons Program works to reconcile the well-being and resilience of local, Indigenous, and forest-dependent communities with wildlife conservation objectives.
Third sector organisations have a critical contribution to make in response to the climate emergency. But reducing their carbon footprints isn’t it. In this blog, Nick Addington offers some thoughts about a possible framework to help organisations think more broadly about their role and recognise opportunities to help achieve a sustainable future.
Annual giving from UK foundations for environmental work nearly doubled between 2015/16 and 2018/19. We summarise the key findings from the latest edition of the Environmental Funders Network’s 'Where the Green Grants Went' series.
Summary of Dr Garnett's presentation at the EFN Retreat. Most people agree that our food system is broken, but views on what constitutes a good food system are wildly divergent. Tara sketched out four different sustainable food discourses, the arguments they make, and the questions they leave unanswered.
How can funders use the tools we have — our power, privileges and positions — to tackle those things that are most systemic? How can we support climate action that is truly intersectional? Farhana Yamin put forward various suggestions in her keynote talk at EFN's annual retreat.
Notes from Steven Smith's presentation on his hugely useful research on climate-focused organisations, followed by a discussion with his collaborator, Ian Christie, at the 2021 EFN Retreat.
It is widely documented that mental health is affected by a complex interplay of genetic, psychological, social / lifestyle factors, and environmental exposures. In recent years evidence of the environmental determinants of mental health has grown, yet these emerging concerns are often under the radar in the third sector.
Explore EFN's information on climate-related grantmaking from funders that participated in EFN’s Climate Funders Group in 2020.
In the summer of 2020, Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation were considering how they could help tackle the climate crisis. They engaged us – Lucent Consultancy – to help with some background research. Today we share what we learnt about green funders’ grantmaking, as one of the main tools to influence change.
Why we need to connect young people to their sense of rebellion to help improve their mental health and protect the environment at the same time.
British millennials have the second worst mental wellbeing in the world, second only to Japan. What if the solution to the mental health crisis facing young people is the same as tackling environmental degradation?
We asked 92 chief executives of environmental organisations, “Which non-profit UK environmental organisations (not including your own) do you think accomplish the most, given the resources at their disposal?” Here's what they told us.
It becomes clearer with each passing day that simply ameliorating current problems is not going to be sufficient. This blog is about how we might scale up transformative change.