Philanthropists are committing more funding than ever toward mitigating the effects of climate change, but the accelerated pace of giving is still far from what is needed to address the “massive” challenges it presents to the world’s population, according to a new report from ClimateWorks Foundation.
ClimateWorks is a nonprofit organization with a team of researchers, strategists, and grantmakers, among others. The group’s second annual funding trends report, released Thursday, compared data from 2019 and 2020 and found that while the entrance of new donors and commitments led to a 14% increase in global philanthropic giving to climate change mitigation, it still represented less than 2% of total philanthropic giving in 2020.
“While we saw positive trends across climate change mitigation philanthropy in 2020, greater and more sustained levels of giving are needed to match the massive scale of the challenge.”
— Surabi Menon, vice president of global intelligence, ClimateWorks“The climate emergency isn’t slowing down,” Surabi Menon, ClimateWorks vice president of global intelligence, said in a statement. “While we saw positive trends across climate change mitigation philanthropy in 2020, greater and more sustained levels of giving are needed to match the massive scale of the challenge.”
Some of the areas that received the most funding were sustainable finance, food and agriculture, and clean electricity. Areas where ClimateWorks said additional funding is needed include climate change solutions that integrate racial justice and equity, as well as those that deal with transport sector emissions.
Still, the report found that philanthropic giving to climate change mitigation increased more quickly than overall philanthropic giving, which went up by 3% percent between 2019 to 2020.
Of an estimated $750 billion in philanthropic giving for 2020, between $6 billion and $10 billion went to climate change mitigation, according to the data. That is compared to 2019, when climate change mitigation philanthropy only accounted for roughly $5 billion to $9 billion of the estimated $730 billion in global philanthropic giving.
The report also showed that foundation funding for climate change mitigation had increased from nearly $900 million in 2015 to at least $1.9 billion in 2020.
Much of this growth was helped by the emergence of a new crop of major donors, such as the Bezos Earth Fund established by Amazon founder Jeff Bezos in 2020. Last year, ClimateWorks received a $12.5 million grant from the Bezos Earth Fund for decarbonizing shipping.
Bill Gates: Climate change calls for 'innovation by a deadline'
Bill Gates speaks with Alok Sharma, president of COP26, about the role that governments must play in accelerating the innovation pipeline needed to bring greenhouse gas emissions down to zero by 2050.
ClimateWorks said it is hopeful that giving in this area will continue to increase. More funders are now giving at the scale needed to address the scope of the challenges, which provides an early indicator of accelerating climate action in 2021, according to the report.
Some of the funders ClimateWorks highlighted for “giving at the scale” were the IKEA Foundation and the Rockefeller Foundation, which recently pledged $1 billion to address climate change and energy poverty. Laurene Powell Jobs’ recently announced $3.5 billion pledge to climate action and a $5 billion commitment from nine foundations to nature conservation were also noted.
Philanthropies are on track to exceed an updated 2018 Global Climate Action Summit goal to commit at least $6 billion in major climate pledges by 2025, ClimateWorks said.
And grantees are “better positioned than ever” to deploy resources toward climate action “at the speed and the scale that is needed to address the climate crisis,” Menon said.
The report comes just a month before the start of COP 26, where philanthropists, governments, private companies, and others are expected to make new commitments to climate funding.
About the author
Stephanie Beasley@Steph_Beasley
Stephanie Beasley is a Senior Reporter at Devex, where she covers global philanthropy with a focus on regulations and policy. She is an alumna of the UC Berkeley Graduate School of Journalism and Oberlin College and has a background in Latin American studies. She previously covered transportation security at POLITICO.
