Tag: investment

What’s next for philanthropy? More investment and more cooperation.

Washington-area philanthropy is becoming unabashedly business-minded. Practices such as impact investing and public-private partnerships that were experiments after the recession are now expected to be regular giving habits for many do-gooders. And that’s just for starters. Capital Business caught up with a few local philanthropy thought leaders to see what’s next for local giving in the region:

Jennifer Pryce

President of the Calvert Foundation

The Calvert Foundation does not operate like a traditional foundation, shelling out grants to nonprofits. Instead, it invites individuals to invest in notes backing a portfolio of organizations with social missions, such as education, affordable housing and fighting poverty. This is not a new idea. Calvert has been doing it for 20 years, raising $1 billion over that time. But Pryce said we can expect to see much more of it in Washington this year, as more foundations look to invest their endowments in socially minded concerns. “If their mission is creating jobs, they are looking for investments that are supporting job growth,” Pryce said. “How do you invest the endowment in a way that preserves the capital but you have it invested in good? This is huge in the foundation world and a lot are asking themselves that question.”

Another trend Pryce expects is more partnerships between government, businesses and philanthropists to fund social causes — public-private partnerships. Last fall, then-D.C. mayor Vincent C. Gray explored the idea of offering bonds to fund a project that would reduce teen pregnancy. “Much much more often I’m working in partnership with foundations and the government. It’s really a group hug,” Pryce said.

Jean Case

Chief executive of the
Case Foundation and the wife of
AOL co-founder Steve Case

In June, Steve and Jean Case committed $50 million to the Case Foundation for impact investing. Jean Case said she believes the momentum for impact investing will increase particularly for what is known as pay-for-success bonds, or social impact bonds. If a public project achieves its goal, the government pays back donors with a small profit. There is currently a bill before Congress, the Social Impact Bond Act, that would provide incentives for communities across the nation to introduce these bonds. She said this trend will heighten the standards of performance for the nonprofit sector, even more than it has in the past few years. “It’ll put a heavy focus on measurement and outcomes, which will have a spillover effect to make all of our programs more effective,” Case said.

World’s first aid academy to target Arab relief workers

Training Arab aid workers as first responders to local disasters and conflict could shrink the cost of responding to global crises, according to the CEO of the world’s first academy for humanitarian relief.

A dearth of frontline aid workers from the region slows the delivery of relief in the first, crucial 48hrs after a disaster, and ramps up costs as agencies parachute in foreign teams, said Saba Al-Mubaslat, CEO, Humanitarian Leadership Academy (HLA).

“When the Syria crisis response began in Jordan, Lebanon and Iraq, we found the number of those able to hit the ground running, speak the language and understand the cultural aspects, were minimal,”Al-Mubaslat told Philanthropy Age. “That’s concerning because it translates into costs. If each aid worker needs a translator, for example, to communicate with the affected population, then you are in trouble.”

The HLA, a collaboration between the private sector, governments and global aid agencies, aims to train 100,000 people from 50 countries in the next five years as relief workers. Based in London, it hopes to launch operations in the Middle East next year, and open 10 training centres around the world by 2020.

Last year saw a record number of severe global humanitarian emergencies, with the highest number of refugees the world has seen since the second world war. Some 50 million people were forced to flee their homes.

Though international aid agencies will always be able to offer additional resources and expertise, the HLA could help create local teams able to lead relief efforts, Al-Mubaslat said. The academy hopes to train 4,520 individuals globally in its first year. There are just 450,000 professional humanitarian workers worldwide, according to the charity’s estimates.

Another tactic could be to set up national databases to track aid workers – and their skillsets – who could be called on in times of crisis. “[A database] is not an innovation; it’s a need,” she said.

Another challenge is encouraging local graduates and school leavers to consider aid work as a serious career option. Deterrents include lower salaries than those seen in other industries, the lack of relevant courses in Arabic, and limited information about how to advance in the industry.

“Learning materials are mostly not available in Arabic, so it becomes a prerequisite to have good English – those who had good education and private schools – to professionalise their careers as aid workers, rather than those who were less fortunate,” said Al-Mubaslat. “One of the key points of the academy is to facilitate access to quality learning and experience exchange.”

Moreover, the academy wants to promote a shift in thinking towards investing in disaster preparedness and the money that could be saved from limiting economic losses. “What we want to change is the upfront, proactive investment in building people’s capacity,” said Al-Mubaslat. “Preparedness is investment you make even if you’re not sure it will be needed. [But] when it is needed, it pays back immediately. That’s the discussion we need to have with governments.”

HLA hopes to swell the ranks of understaffed emergency aid teams, who face a rising number of complex global disasters, including the more than 4 million Syrian refugees in the region. The academy has received just over 40 per cent of the £50m ($77.5m) it needs for the first five-year phase.

Investment in aid professionals continues to pay dividends even once the initial shock has passed, added Al-Mubaslat. “The need for aid workers in the recovery stage is going to be immense. The whole Middle East is being reshaped. The better prepared we are, the more we can all contribute to shaping it in a positive way.”

National Funding Scheme’s DONATE raises £250,000

The National Funding Scheme has now raised over £250,000 for charities through its DONATE giving platform in just over two years.

Founded in March 2013, DONATE was originally provided specifically for and cultural organisations, where it is being used by over 350 art galleries, museums, theatres and heritage sites. It has now been extended to all UK charities.

Notable successes for the platform include the £75,000 raised in the four days following the Battersea Arts Centre fire, over £9,000 raised for the Watts Gallery, £18,000 raised at a charity cricket match (shared between Walking with the Wounded and Combat Stress) and just under £20,000 raised for a landmine charity.

DONATE passes on donors’ details, if they give permission, to the recipient charity. It says that 99% of the donors to Battersea Arts Centre’s emergency appeal asked for their details to be passed on.

The National Funding Scheme sustains its service by charging a small proportion of the Gift Aid that eligible donors donate via the mobile and online platform. When no Gift Aid is added it charges 2.5% of the total gift, “half the rate charged by commercial providers”. By extending the service to all charities, the National Funding Scheme believes it can reduce these fees further.

The service is run by two separate organisations – a technology company and a charity. This governance procedure means that DONATE “can bring in investment for ongoing technical development that the charity would not be able to support”.