Keith Madden (ELP 2022) | Manager, Environment Area, Rotary Foundation of Rotary International, United States

From some of the recent headline one would think we are approaching a new normal where dollars for environmental protection are no longer scarce. Yet funding to tackle climate change still represents just 2% of global giving and “less than 1% of philanthropic environmental funding goes to grassroots climate action in the Global South” (Source: Inside Philanthropy). This is not strategic considering 1) how climate change impacts threaten achievement of other social priorities, 2) an understanding of who are the people actually safeguarding tropical and sub-tropical environments locally, and 3) who is most affected by climate change. At the same time, anecdotal experiences and colleagues indicate that things are not getting any easier yet for NGOs and communities trying to navigate proposal processes and channel resources where they need to go.

From UN reports and environmental journalism, we can conclude that more money flowing to the environment does not necessarily mean better results. Plus, if we are not careful misplaced priorities can lead to costly mistakes, such as carbon credit projects that displace local stewardship systems, or Payment for ecosystem services (PES) programs whose wealth infusions accidentally expand extractive capacity instead of conservation. International development programs by bilateral and multilateral organizations like the World Bank, Asian Development Bank, and BNDES (Brazilian Development Bank) have for decades now been managing far larger amounts of money than most philanthropies, aimed generally at sustainable development and now ostensibly the UN Sustainable Development Goals. Significant responsibility rests with them to set the tone for equitable solutions, be open to innovative ideas, and own up to the mistakes of the past.

While some philanthropists deliberate over how much flexible overhead (or indirect costs) should be ceded to recipients, a less discussed but equally consequential issue is whether funders can effectively estimate costs of reaching different environmental solution and come to agreements on how to budget for them correctly and holistically. There are few norms for reporting back cost after actions reach milestones or failure, made more unpredictable by latent threats to biodiversity that can reappear and NGOs often working against the clock. While philanthropy decision-makers try to strike a balance between accounting for professionalized fund management and transferring as high a percentage of funds as possible directly to the field, the reality is that regranting and management teams, whether in the form large hierarchical conservation organizations (so-called Big International NGOs or “BINGOs”) or consulting firms based in capital cities of the Global North, retain a huge piece of the pie, and large charitable conservation organizations particularly those with US-based headquarters could find themselves with salary inequity concerns just like other sectors.

Looking at the big picture, political-economic agendas can also interfere with the best use of funds for biodiversity hotspots, climate approaches, and more. To take one example from my past work in South America, it is noticeable that countries who have been characterized by decades of governments friendlier to privatizations, free-markets and trade liberalization, such as Peru and Colombia, tend to attract more consistent and larger environmental funding from the US and Global North. Adjacent countries with more anti-globalization politics in the same era, such as Bolivia and to an extent Ecuador, have struggled to sustain similar levels of international conservation funding as their neighbors even when it need not pass through the hands of their government. Meanwhile, Venezuela has been largely abandoned by environmental funders, even though there are still a handful environmental NGOs continuing to do good work there against all odds, such as Provita, and Wataniba. Regardless of government, we shouldn’t let certain communities or ecosystems suffer for reasons like these if there is something that can still be done to help environmentally. Likewise, environmental organizations need to keep rebuilding trust with indigenous peoples and other marginalized groups. Funders can start doing their part by taking a critical look at their investment policies and participation policies. They can delink any personal economic philosophy being promoted by wealthy founders/donors from program work if necessary, since the former can be inappropriate for diverse nonprofit contexts more often than not.

On a personal level, working in environmental philanthropy is not for everyone because you must possess a temperament to be OK saying “no” to project ideas much more than you can say “yes”. Since the need for priority setting and collaborative leadership is large, it is helpful then to think of grantmaking staff as offering more than just funds by helping with capacity-building, advising, and coordinating communications among recipients as peers as well. Charitable foundations and their partners still struggle with confronting intractable environmental issues and contradictions head-on by engaging the right stakeholders, versus settling for low-hanging fruit, often a default option. Increasingly I believe environmental nonprofits can find success by playing to either end of this spectrum intelligently but are challenged more when indecisively in the middle; in other words, try framing each project or program as either as a tried and true formula for quick, measurable results, or quite differently as a pathway to a systemic goal involving a complex theory of change. As the funder, a sort of detached objective analysis often wins the day for matching winning proposals to funds as long as there is sufficient transparency all around, although I remember one influential former colleague telling us only half-jokingly that “gossip” amongst our communities of practice was our primary evaluation metric.

Through some combination of research, workshops, lived experience and word of mouth, my time so far in environmental philanthropy has countered the validity of the single, heroic changemaker narrative. Instead, it has shown me that working together in vast complementary networks of organizations and local communities, a reliable interdependency rather than competition and protagonism, is how we really get things done for the benefit of our planet.