Global giving to curb climate change rose by 20 percent in 2023, according to a report released Tuesday by the ClimateWorks Foundation. That growth outpaced worldwide charitable giving, which the report says grew by 10 percent in 2023.
According to the report, foundations and donors gave $9.3 to $15.8 billion in 2023. Giving from foundations rose to a record $4.8 billion, up from $4.2 billion in 2022. Foundation giving to climate-related efforts has almost tripled since 2019.
“This is an encouraging sign of the momentum on giving to climate action,” Helen Mountford, CEO of ClimateWorks, said in a briefing.
But she also pointed out vast challenges ahead. This year will most likely be the hottest year on record. To avert the worst effects of climate change, global greenhouse gas emissions need to be cut nearly in half by 2030 — a goal countries are falling behind on. “We must use every opportunity we can to accelerate climate action. Every fraction of a degree of avoided warming matters,” she said. “It saves lives and reduces costs and protects our ecosystems.”
Clean electricity efforts received the most climate money from grant makers — $1.83 billion in 2023. That was followed by forests at $1.3 billion and food and agriculture at $1 billion.
Funding remains tilted toward the United States and Europe. From 2019 to 2023, groups based in those regions received 60 percent of foundation funding directed to a single country or region. Organizations in Africa, Asia, Oceania, and Latin America received just 20 percent. U.S. and European groups were far more likely to receive unrestricted foundation funding. One third of U.S. and European nonprofits received unrestricted funding, compared with just 14 percent of groups in low- and middle-income countries.
“The regions which are most vulnerable to climate impacts but have large populations continue to face significant underfunding,” said Surabi Menon, vice president of global intelligence at ClimateWorks and one of the report’s co-authors. “Without flexible funding, organizations in many of these regions will struggle to build long-term strong capacity or be able to respond to emergent challenges.”
Efforts to Adapt to Climate Change
Although the report focused on efforts to reduce carbon emissions, it also found that foundations gave about $600 million in 2023 to efforts to adapt to the impacts of climate change. The authors expect that to grow to $650 or $700 million in 2024.
Quadrature Climate Foundation, based in London, added adaptation to its list of climate priorities after an extensive strategic review last year, the foundation’s CEO Jess Ayers said in the briefing. The grant maker is focusing on extreme heat, an increasingly deadly result of climate change. In part, it was a moral decision, Ayers said.
“We are coming to realize the extent to which human suffering is escalating because we are not where we need to be on the mitigation agenda. We know now that we are likely to exceed 1.5 degrees in the 2030s. We’re going to be reaching critical tipping points, and suffering is going to get worse,” she said. “Those who are suffering the most are the least responsible for the causes of climate change, so there’s a fundamental justice imperative.”
Ayers worries that countries will be so pressed to cope with escalating disasters and emergencies that they will stray from mitigation efforts. “If we don’t work on building resilience, we’re going to derail the entire climate agenda,” Ayers said.
Climate funding has increased every year ClimateWorks has published this report, but Mountford pointed out that much more spending on clean energy is still needed because fossil-fuel companies are much better funded — even when it comes to public dollars. Globally fossil-fuel industries receive $1.3 trillion in subsidies and tax breaks, she said. Even moving a small portion of that money to help renewable energy would go a long way.
“There’s a big block there. We need to move that. We need to shift that,” Mountford said. “But the transition is going to happen regardless of who’s in power.”
