The 15 interviews bring to life some key themes:

Joy: Environmental issues provoke a range of emotions across the interviewees, from anxiety to outrage, fear to fury. But a common theme is the joy, satisfaction and sense of purpose that donors and funders derive from acting to solve those problems. ‘Action absorbs anxiety,’ says Stephanie Mills. ‘I’m involved, I can do something… I’ve found that it takes away some of the scariness of climate change and feeling so helpless.’ ‘It’s the most rewarding thing you can do,’ says Jessica Sweidan. ‘Once you’re involved in it, it’s really hard to shake.’

Ambition: There is a powerful sense of ambition amongst the interviewees. For many the goal is nothing short of the transformation of the world as we know it, though the scales at which they are operating may vary. Jon Cracknell calls for more ambition among a broader group of environmental donors: ‘There are still a lot of funders who are too nervous about engaging with politics, with a small “p”. It’s well past the moment where we need to drop that nervousness. The radical right or “anti-environment” funders absolutely engage with the political system and don’t have any qualms about doing that.’ Renata Minerbo focuses on the economy itself, seeing that the many environmental issues stem from the way the economy functions: ‘We want to encourage a transition towards a more eco-centric economy, where people are part of nature… [Through our investments] we experiment with different financial models that help us move away from the extractive relationships.’

Urgency: A sense of urgency permeates the interviews. Several of the funders decided to spend all of their funds this decade, in order to stave off the worst of the climate and nature crises. Others created new initiatives to fill what they saw as a significant gap in our response to the challenge. ‘I saw a video clip from Professor Kevin Anderson, the climate scientist,’ says Nick Oldridge. ‘The words that he was saying are the most important words on the planet. That’s not hyperbole, he was just spelling out where we are versus where we should be. I thought, this content should be on the BBC.’ Sophie Marple feels similarly: ‘Now is when you can have the most impact, before the crisis gets really advanced. Small amounts of money can still change things.’

Interconnection: Environmental issues are impossible to disentangle from social issues. Eli Manderson Evans puts it this way: ‘The climate breakdown doesn’t affect us all equally; it’s those who are most vulnerable in society who are most vulnerable to its effects.’ Julia Davies sees how this has played out in the UK: ‘My family are from South Wales, which powered the Industrial Revolution with coal. Most people of those communities didn’t benefit significantly; they were left in poverty.’ Sufina Ahmed describes how the John Ellerman Foundation incorporates this interconnection into their grantmaking strategy: ‘We look to work with grant partners for whom change-making is core to what they do.’ 

Trust: Almost everyone I interviewed had come to the same conclusion: that giving flexible, multi-year funding to organisations (and to individuals, in some cases) was more effective than project-based grants with heavy reporting requirements. Several drew the same analogy: in the commercial world, investors trust management teams to allocate their funds as they see fit, and can understand that it may be years before they see a profit. ‘But in the not-for-profit world, we micromanage grantees, and ask them to deliver on things in six months, one year, two years. Why do we do this?’ asks Sonal Patel.

Love: Literally, the essence of philanthropy, but expanded for these funders to include not just ‘man’ (anthropos) but all our fellow beings. For many of the interviewees, what has cultivated this love of nature is time outside: Becky and Lauren Holmes playing in their grandparents’ gardens as children; Ben Goldsmith building ponds as a child and walking the land with neighbours every Friday as an adult; Leonie Taylor experiencing a state of wonder watching her trees produce fruit every season. ‘All of my enthusiasm, my energy, my sense of well-being, my love for nature – all the motivation to do everything that I do develops while I’m in Somerset, close to nature,’ says Ben.

Each interviewee approaches the problems we are facing in different ways, often rooted in quite different values. The scale of their giving ranges from the tens of thousands to the tens of millions. Each interview is self-contained. You don’t need to read them in order. As you dip into them, some will likely resonate; others may challenge your ways of thinking. Nature teaches us that diversity underpins resilience and adaptability in the face of change. The independence and variety of funders is both the challenge and the advantage of philanthropy. Perhaps the key questions are what can each of us contribute – financial or otherwise – and how do we ensure we become more than the sum of our parts?

Florence Miller
Director of EFN, 2012-2024