We’re funding the work of Food Frontier – Australia and New Zealand’s think tank on alternative proteins – to help diversify protein supply with nutritious and sustainable alternatives.

With the world’s population tipped to reach 10 billion by 2050, demand for protein will continue to rise. Global economic, environmental and public health authorities have stressed that a more diverse range of protein sources will be essential to feeding growing populations safely and sustainably into the future.

To grow and galvanise the market for alternative proteins across our region, Food Frontier helps businesses, policymakers and innovators to understand the emergence of plant-based meat, precision fermentation and cultivated meat, and unlock the economic, environmental, and public health benefits they offer. 

Influence:

Over the course of our funding, the following advancements have been achieved in the alternative proteins ecosystem:

• 85% growth in plant-based meat brands on-shelf, with 26 brands now made by local companies

• More than 150% growth in the number of plant-based meat products on-shelf in Australia, with more than 250 products now available.

• 83% growth in the number of plant-based meat companies operating in Australia and New Zealand

• The number of cellular agriculture companies doubled in Australia and New Zealand

• Food Frontier hosted the first-ever Alternative Proteins national conference, bringing together hundreds of leading food and agriculture specialists and policy makers from around Australia.

Environmental Justice Australia (EJA) is a leading public interest legal organisation. Their lawyers act on behalf of people and community organisations to safeguard health; to protect magnificent forests, rivers and wildlife; and to tackle climate change. They partner with communities and other social justice organisations because we are stronger together.

The Environment Council of Central Queensland (ECoCeQ), a small volunteer environment group, has commenced litigation against Environment Minister Tanya Plibersek for failing to accept the climate harm of new coal and gas to our environment.

Represented by Environmental Justice Australia, ECoCeQ argues the science is clear: new coal mine expansions like Whitehaven’s Narrabri and MACH’s Mount Pleasant pose a serious and irreversible threat to our climate and to thousands of threatened animals, plants and places across Australia.

They argue the Minister acted unlawfully when she refused to accept the climate harm these projects are likely to cause, as outlined in thousands of scientific reports, including from the IPCC and her own department.
If successful, ECoCeQ hopes these cases will transform how Australia’s Environment Ministers now and into the future assess climate risk – so the climate harm of every new coal or gas mine can never be ignored again.

Original Power’s mission is to build the power, skills, capacity and collective capability of First Nations people to genuinely self-determine what happens in their communities and on their country. A key pillar of Original Power’s work is their First Nations Clean Energy program.

Original Power’s First Nations Clean Energy Network (FNCEN) is focussed on renewable energy projects, from small community-based projects to large-scale and export-focussed initiatives, which are gaining momentum across the country. This is a significant revolution in energy production that does not currently adequately include and engage with First Nation peoples. There are large barriers which need to be addressed to ensure First Nations people are a part of the economic transition to clean energies and benefit equitably from commercial opportunities that will arise. Guided by a high-profile steering group, the network is focussed on addressing these issues through three key pillars:

1. Community:
   • Focus on removing barriers to First Nations people having access to secure, cheaper, cleaner energy.
   • Develop guides for land councils and community organisations to be equipped and ready to engage on renewable energy projects.
   • Build capacity and advocate for opportunities for First Nations people to be at the table, influencing and shaping the energy transformation (using local examples).
2. Policy reform:
   • Policy reform and changes to the way renewables are delivered to First Nations households and communities.
   • Governments at all levels to invest in these reforms and lift the barriers to clean energy access.
3. Industry partnerships:
   • Establish best practice principles for companies to implement and investors to demand. The principles centre First Nations people and their communities in the development, design and implementation – including benefit sharing – of any clean energy projects. The principles will deliver benefits to First Nations communities and will help achieve energy security - linked to better health, social and educational outcomes.

As the peak environmental NGO for the Kimberley region in far north-west Australia, Environs Kimberley is dedicated to looking after the health of the land and waters of the region. They do this through advocacy and on-ground cultural and natural resource management projects.

We’re supporting Environs Kimberley to fight gas developments in the Canning Basin. The Canning Basin in the Kimberley holds one of the largest fossil fuel reserves in the world. Recently updated estimates indicate there’s 438.5 TCF of unconventional shale and tight gas resources in the Basin, this compares to an estimated 13 TCF in the offshore Scarborough field held by Woodside. The carbon footprint of Canning Basin resources is equivalent to double Australia’s carbon budget under the Paris Agreement.

Production of oil and gas through fracking in the Kimberley would lead to mass land clearing for well pads, pipelines, pumping stations, roads and the destruction of biodiversity on a large scale. The pollution from this industry could have a significant impact on wetlands, groundwater and rivers like the Martuwarra Fitzroy.

Environs Kimberley are educating and mobilising local communities to advocate for a healthy climate and to keep fossil fuels in the ground, including working in partnership with Traditional Owner groups that cover nine different Aboriginal Ranger groups from the desert to the sea. Environs Kimberley also work with local and state governments to challenge policies and drilling licenses and developments that put our climate under more pressure.

We’re funding Beyond Zero Emissions (BZE) to support their work establishing Renewable Energy Industrial Precincts (REIP) across Australia: clusters of manufacturers powered by 100% renewable energy. Australian manufacturing is among the most carbon-intensive in the world. It accounts for 21 per cent of national emissions (including the electricity manufacturing uses). Carbon tariffs and the growing popularity of zero-emission supply chains put Australian industry at risk if we do not act soon to repower it with renewable energy.

Each precinct will be located in Renewable Energy Zones or connected to renewable energy generation through high-voltage transmission, have access to clean heat and renewable hydrogen production, skilled workforces, and export infrastructure, including transport.

Beyond Zero Emissions is focused on bringing the recommendation to life in two key regions: the Hunter Valley and Gladstone, with other locations planned for later work. BZE’s objective is to build and showcase industry and community support for REIP’s to drive momentum for an outcome of a national policy, with the federal government committing at least $2 billion over five years. 

Potential impact:

BZE have released commissioned research which finds that if REIP’s eventuate in the Hunter and Gladstone regions, they have the potential to¹:

• Create 45,000 new ongoing jobs
• Create an extra $13 billion in annual revenue in the Hunter and Gladstone regions alone
• Attract new industries and tens of billions of investment dollars into regional areas
• Bring high-quality jobs back onshore

1. Renewable Energy Industrial Precincts: Economic Analysis Summary Report: 2020 State of the Industry: Australia’s Plant-Based Meat Sector

Climateworks aims to embed net-zero emissions targets into city decarbonization policies, focusing on transport and buildings. By engaging stakeholders, it is working to contribute to the National Urban Policy Framework and City Deals reform, providing well-informed policy recommendations to expedite decarbonization. The impact will be significant, with climate action and net-zero emissions becoming core objectives of multi-level government collaboration. The National Urban Policy Framework will drive city decarbonization through essential policies, and pilot projects will showcase tangible progress towards ambitious goals, making strides against climate change in Australia.

The climate and biodiversity crises are accelerating and under-resourced and under-funded individuals and groups are struggling to change the trajectory of ongoing decline. That’s why we’re funding a newly created non-profit organisation, the Australian Conservation and Biodiversity Foundation (ACBF), to protect and restore Australia’s native forests by rapidly building capacity across multiple sectors. By 2030, ACBF aims to achieve:

• the end to commercial logging and clearing of Australia’s forests
• 8 million hectares of restoration of forest habitats

This will deliver 100 million tonnes of abatement a year and help recover hundreds of threatened plant and animal species. Achieving these goals will require a major intervention – to develop and coordinate a broad-based alliance across Australia’s climate and nature movements. This will focus on aligning partners in the business and investor communities, in the scientific community, amongst traditional owners and in rural and regional Australia to deliver a campaign that can transform Australia.

We are working with the Blue Carbon Lab - a research lab within Deakin University – to fund innovative research into Australia’s coastal vegetated systems (seagrass meadows, tidal marshes, mangrove forests), collectively known as Blue Carbon ecosystems.

These ecosystems act as natural sinks of carbon, effectively reducing atmospheric CO2 concentrations that contribute to climate change. They can trap carbon 30-50 times faster than typical "green" forests (eg. boreal forest, rainforest), where it is locked away for centuries to millennia. Blue Carbon ecosystems also support additional ecosystem services including enhanced biodiversity (eg. sustain migratory birds), support fisheries, provide ecotourism revenues and protect our coast against erosion and extreme weather events.

This collaborative project will generate new knowledge in preparation for, and in response to, climate change. It will enable us to better understand and predict the degree to which the natural process of biosequestration from coastal vegetated systems will help offset anthropogenic emissions.
Specifically, the fully funded PhD project will:

• Determine rates of blue carbon accumulation from restored blue carbon ecosystems (currently data is only available from mature ecosystems),
• Perform a cost benefit analyses from previously restored coastal wetlands (including valuation of blue carbon offsets, biodiversity gains, coastal protection and other social benefits),
• Trial low-cost sensors and techniques for evaluating blue carbon gains from restoration of coastal wetlands.

 Image credit: Blue Carbon Labs

Accounting for Nature’s vision is to become a global leader for measuring change in the health of the environment. Accounting for Nature works with farmers, First Nations land managers, private conservation organisations, businesses, impact investors, governments and regional natural resource management organisations to implement the Accounting for Nature framework – a world leading, scientifically rigorous methodology for measuring environmental condition.

Australian Ethical Foundation funding will support the development of Accounting for Nature's Cultural Condition Framework - a reporting standard to recognise and assess the condition of culturally significant First Nations environmental assets using traditional ecological knowledge. It will also link these assessments to environmental accounts so to improve the credibility of market claims associated with carbon offset and other natured-based solutions.

Greenfleet is a leading Australian not-for-profit environmental organisation protecting our climate by restoring our forests. They plant biodiverse native forests to capture carbon emissions on behalf of individuals and businesses and help fight the impacts of climate change.

The Foundation funding is being used to help revegetate a 340-hectare property that forms part of the Wychitella Bio-link in Central Victoria. Greenfleet is working with the Traditional Custodians of the land, the Dja Dja Wurrung people, to revegetate the property with native trees and grasses, creating a vital vegetation link. This project is restoring resilient ecosystems and creating habitat for local wildlife species, including Lace Monitors, Quolls, Shy Heathwrens, Inland Thornbills, and the vulnerable Mallee Fowl.

Influence:

The project will restore 340 hectares of native ecosystem, create landscape connectivity and address critical biodiversity loss, capture carbon emissions to protect our climate, reduce soil erosion, improve water quality and restore critical habitat for wildlife. The forest the Foundation is creating will be legally protected for 100 years.

Wildlife Asia’s mission is to protect Asia’s tropical forests and key landscapes which host the highest levels of biodiversity and iconic megafauna habitat.

The Leuser Ecosystem is recognised as the most critical remaining habitat for survival of the Sumatran rhino, and the largest population can be found in western Leuser. Sadly, outside of western Leuser, sub-populations have become isolated and numbers are dangerously low. By deploying intensive monitoring solutions and teams, as well as developing strong relationships with local communities by providing local employment and education, Wildlife Aisa are able to ensure the protection of some of the world's most valuable biodiversity and carbon stores.

The Australian Ethical Foundation is working with Mimal Land Management Aboriginal Corporation and the Karrkad Kanjdji Trust (KKT) to support Indigenous women rangers in West and Central Arnhem Land.

KKT works with Indigenous Ranger groups in one Australia’s most culturally rich and biodiverse regions - West and Central Arnhem Land. KKT brings together ranger groups, communities and philanthropists to address some of our nation’s most pressing issues, including environmental conservation, education and employment. The work we are supporting is 100 per cent community driven, from concept to implementation.

KKT's six areas of focus are:

1. Biodiversity - native species conservation
2. Women - meaningful ranger employment
3. Culture - management of heritage
4. Education - on country, bicultural programs
5. Community - sustainability of remote ranger bases
6. Climate - carbon abatement and traditional burning

The Karrkad Kanjdji Trust (KKT) was established by the Traditional Owners of Warddeken and Djelk Indigenous Protected Areas (IPAs) in 2010. Their name, Karrkad Kanjdji (pronounced gar-gut gun-jee), refers to the stone country highlands and savanna lowlands of Arnhem Land that they seek to protect.

Impact:

The Australian Ethical Foundation has been supporting KKT since 2018, as one of the first supporters for KKT's newest ranger partner at the time, Mimal Land Management in Central Arnhem Land. Since then, Mimal has grown from six rangers and one coordinator to over 30 experienced rangers, five coordinators and a team of management and project staff supporting them. From a starting point of seven projects, rangers now deliver over 80 projects fully directed by Traditional Owners to realise their vision for healthy country and culture.

The Women Rangers project led by Mimal Land Management in Central Arnhem Land has made significant strides over the years, providing equal opportunities for women in land management. The program has seen notable success with increased female employment and active involvement in critical initiatives, including species recovery, rock art preservation, and fire management. barriers, develop leadership skills, and support each other in environmental conservation and community wellbeing. This Indigenous-led initiative exemplifies the value of empowering women to create positive change for a sustainable and inclusive future in Arnhem Land.

The Fistula Foundation is the global leader in fistula treatment, providing more surgeries to more women than any other organisation. Obstetric fistula occurs when a mother has a prolonged, obstructed labour but lacks access to emergency medical care, such as a C-section. If untreated, a woman will uncontrollably leak urine, stool, or both, for the rest of her life, making this one of humanity’s most disabling injuries.

Australian Ethical Foundation project funding will be directed to Fistula Foundation’s obstetric fistula surgeries in Pakistan. More than 60% of Pakistan’s population live in rural areas with limited access to maternal healthcare, putting women at risk of developing obstetric fistula. Fistula Foundation’s treatment partner, Pakistan National Forum on Women’s Health (PNFWH), estimates there are between 3,000 to 5,000 new cases every year. As the only hospital network in Pakistan offering free fistula treatment, PNFWH’s services are vital to ensuring women have access to care. In addition, because PNFWH is based in the capital city of Karachi and operates a network of regional fistula centres, it is uniquely positioned to reach women across the country. 

Impact:

Over the life of the project, over 400 women will be treated for obstetric fistula¹.

1. Australian Ethical Foundation reporting

The Australian Ethical Foundation has been supporting Living Goods to reliably deliver lifesaving, affordable, critical medicines to the doorsteps of millions in Uganda. Living Goods recruits, trains, equips, and manages networks of Community Health Workers (CHW’s) who provide their communities with health education, accurate diagnoses, essential medicines, and health products that save and improve lives. Living Goods programs address the significant shortage of frontline health workers and the inadequate distribution of health products and knowledge.

Living Goods works with governments and partners to ensure community health workers have access to digital technology, medical treatments, supervision and compensation to cost-effectively deliver high quality, impactful health services.

Impact:

In 2021, CHW’s funded by the Australian Ethical Foundation:

• Supported 11,500 people in their communities

• Provided 4,645 treatments and positive diagnoses to children under five-years-old

• Administered over 6,000 assessments to children under five-years-old

• Registered 395 pregnancies

• Continued delivering vital health services and scaled family planning services

Furthermore, the preliminary results from a new external Randomized Controlled Trial (RCT) of Living Goods supported CHWs in Uganda show a strong 30% reduction in U5 child mortality and a 27% reduction in infant mortality. This highlights that well-equipped and supported CHWs can save lives at scale, but also showcases how and why data and research are such critical enablers for iterating and improving community health programs.

1. Australian Ethical Foundation annual acquittal reporting

Pollinate Group empowers women from neglected communities in India and Nepal as entrepreneurs and leaders for change. They recruit, train and support a network of women entrepreneurs to deliver clean, sustainable energy solutions to the communities they live in.

We support Pollinate Group’s work in Nepal as they upskill and support local women to sell products and services that improve quality of life in their communities and ultimately help to lead their communities out of poverty by sourcing high-performing, durable products that reduce carbon emissions and improve quality of life.

In eight years they have empowered over 650 women and reached more than 650,000 individuals with impactful products like solar lanterns, clean and efficient cooking appliances and sanitary products.

We’re supporting Love Mercy Foundation to scale-up their longstanding agricultural project Cents for Seeds to an additional 2,000 vulnerable women in Northern Uganda, providing them with farming assistance through access to seeds, fertilisers and agricultural education. This will build the resources and capacity of women to generate sustainable incomes and food security for their families and communities both during and beyond the COVID-19 global recovery.

The funding will also facilitate the smooth transition out of the program and into self-reliance for 3,000 existing program participants from Otuke East and West, Lira, and Alebtong Districts. These women have been participants in the Cents for Seeds program and will commence graduation in 2022 as a result of the program’s creation of sustainable livelihoods in several village areas.

As one of the world’s leading human rights organisations, Human Rights Watch is in a unique position to expose the human cost of climate change and advance urgently needed policies and protections. Researchers at Human Rights Watch cover more than 100 countries, and many of them are documenting the impacts of climate change around the world. Human Rights Watch (HRW) is undertaking a three-year research and advocacy project aimed at showing how advancing the rights and elevating the voices of women, including women within Indigenous and forest-dependent communities, can strengthen and make more impactful efforts to mitigate climate change.

Research shows that protecting forest-dependent communities, including Indigenous peoples’ tenure rights, and ensuring women’s participation, agency and economic empowerment in local forest governance delivers major benefits for climate action. Human Rights Watch has already identified some of the most valuable carbon sinks, including in places like the Greater Mekong region, Indonesia, the Amazon, and the Congo basin. In these regions, their work conducting a critical mapping of safeguards related to land, environmental management and women’s rights to use and manage land and natural resources, can significantly contribute to systemic changes in ownership structures, long term conservation, food security, and promote gender justice objectives within the context of climate change mitigation efforts.

This project aims to make significant inroads toward eliminating discriminatory laws and practices concerning women’s land and property rights and help women around the world to understand, claim and realise their equal rights to land and property.

With the support of Australian Ethical, the Girls Emerge Program has successfully graduated 200 young women in Wakiso & Kyankwanzi Districts, Uganda. The program trains young women in male dominated vocations, including bee-keeping and honey production, briquette and cookstove production, mobile phone repair, and baking. In addition to this training, the young women are provided business mentoring to assist them to build their business skills, marketing and growth plans.

The young women are further supported to establish co-operatives where they work together, are provided capital to invest in their businesses, and share their income in revolving loans, known as Village Savings and Loans (VSLA). The program targets young women who have not been able to complete secondary schooling, providing an alternative education pathway towards their financial independence.

Through PSI's Sexual and Reproductive Health and Rights (SRHR) work over the last several decades in Kenya, it has learned that the journey women face from puberty to menopause remains confusing, unclear, "trial and error" based and often riddled with shame and guilt. In 2020, driven by insights gathered from target demographics, PSI (with funding from the Australian Ethical Foundation) developed and tested SRH content in six countries to gauge the viability of addressing these issues through social enterprise and technology.

PSI knows that sexual pleasure is a driver of sexual behavior. Sex-negative programming often produces effects opposite from those intended, and health programs that incorporate sexual pleasure consistently have positive results. However, evidence is generally limited to high-income settings, and less is known about the relationship between pleasure and sexual activity and potential entry points for pleasure-inclusive programming in different environments.

To address these challenges, PSI, with support from the Australian Ethical Foundatoin, developed Nena, a seamless digital solution to reframe the narrative to make SRHR more meaningful and relevant. Over the last year, PSI refined, optimised and tested this on-demand chatbot as a pleasure forward guide for young people exploring sexual and reproductive health. Through Nena, PSI also improves sexual literacy, self-efficacy and agency.

Nena launched at the end of 2021 and is already proving effective, with online comparison testing showing that content with a pleasure component is 126% more effective at engaging users versus campaigns that only focus on contraception.

Impact

Since launch, Nena has:

• Reached 4,065,896 users through social and behaviour change communications

• Provided 10,000+ users, specifically more than 5,900 women, with access to digital tools

• Achieved an 86% (4.3/5) satisfaction rating for digital health solutions

The Medical Advances Without Animals Trust’s aim is to advance medical science without using animals or animal products for biomedical research.

The MAWA Trust works in partnership with The Australian National University and provides support and funding to universities and medical research institutions throughout Australia. As the only organisation in Australia providing funding to researchers and students in the rapidly developing field of animal replacement in scientific research, MAWA has successfully stimulated broad interest in animal-free alternative approaches within the medical research community.

We’re funding organ-on-chip research work with MAWA at The University of Sydney, specifically the development of lung disease-on-chip. These models will be vital for testing the efficacy of new generation therapeutics to regenerate lungs damaged by disease, including COVID-19. To validate the models, the researchers will investigate the effects of stem cells and stem cell-derived extracellular vesicles on lung structure and functionality. It is expected that this lung disease model will provide accurate representations of physiological responses and allow for testing of lung regeneration thereby replacing the traditional use of animals in this research.

Giving Green & the Australian Ethical Foundation are making it easier for you to give back to the planet.

We’ve funded Australia’s first extensive research into the most impactful climate change charities, so you can donate with complete confidence.