Global Giving Matters May-July 2006 Issue 26

8/9/2019 Global Giving Matters May-July 2006 Issue 26

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Global Giving MATTERS

MayJuly 2006

Buoyed by the recent completion of a successful $20 million fundraising campaign, theGlobal Fund for Women (GFW www.globalfundforwomen.org ) is finding newmomentum in its quest to nurture a growing network of grassroots womens organiza-tions, and to energize feminist philanthropy through the mobilization of what it callsdonor activists.

As it faces the future, however, GFWs trademark resourcefulness is being tested asnever before by the emergence of new threats to womens well-being around the globe from HIV/AIDS and religious fundamentalism to social and economic divides aggra-vated by military conflict and globalization.

As it moves to address these external threats to womens rights, the Global Fund is alsofacing a different type of challenge the task of sustaining, in an era of rapid expan-sion, the close-knit sense of community among grantees and donors that has been acore value since its earliest days.

Seeding change for womenIn fact, the origins of what is today the largest womens fund in the world are remark-ably similar to those of the thousands of grassroots organizations that it serves aroundthe globe a small handful of women finding empowerment by working togethertoward a mutual vision of social change.

In the case of the Global Fund, the vision was supplied in 1987 by Anne Firth Murray , aNew Zealander by birth, who was then director of environment and international pop-ulation programs at the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation . Murray understood thecentral role that women played in development, and was concerned at how littlemoney was going from US donors to support women-run groups internationally.

Frustrated by the lack of support for community-based approaches to internationaldevelopment, particularly those led by women, Murray took action. Inspired by adinner discussion with two other women at the annual conference of the Council onFoundations in 1987, Murray decided to create a new organization to seed, strengthenand link womens groups around the world. Her dinner companions, Frances Kisslingand Laura Lederer , both social activists, signed on as co-founders and GFW was born.(A personal account of Anne Firth Murray's experiences as founder and first presidentof the Global Fund for Women is provided in her recently published book, Paradigm

Found: Leading and Managing for Positive Change.)Accustomed to giving away money in her grantmaking role at the Hewlett Foundation,Murray now had to learn to raise it as well. Critical support was provided in the firstyear by a group of 35 contributors who gave $5,000 each to get GFW off the ground the best five thousand dollars I have ever spent, says founding donor Esther Hewlett .

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Feature: The Global Fund for Women Reshapingphilanthropy along feminist lines


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Empowering women: a pioneering approachFrom the beginning, GFW was pioneering in its approach, which put money directlyinto the hands of women, the true experts at addressing problems in their own com-munities in the developing world, according to Hewlett.

From her work at the Hewlett Foundation, Murray had learned the value of generaloperating grants, which to this day are the primary vehicles for funding GFW grantees.To simplify the application process and respect indigenous traditions, GFW alsodecided it would receive proposals in any language.

Grants typically range from $500 to $20,000 annually and support women-led organi-zations around the globe that are addressing issues such as reproductive health andchoice, access to education, economic independence, political participation, rights ofsexual minorities and prevention of violence against women and children.

GFW relies heavily on the local knowledge of a 139-member global advisory council ofwomen to identify and screen potential grantees and to help evaluate their work oncean applicant organization has received funding.

Listening to the voices of womenThe important thing is how the Global Fund goes about its work, by listening to thevoices of the people it seeks to serve. This was radical in 1987, said Hewlett, whoserved on the GFW board for eight years and attributes her life path as a donoractivist to the influence of Murray and the organization she created.

Hewlett is co-founder of Youth Philanthropy Worldwide , an organization that aims toincrease the next generations involvement in global partnerships, and is a member ofThe Synergos Institute s Global Philanthropists Circle . As a board member of GFW,Hewlett visited grantees in Bangladesh, Nepal, Zimbabwe and Uganda, and attendedthe NGO Forum in Beijing.

One of my hopes for philanthropy, when I look at international aid in particular, isthat perhaps it can learn a little bit from the Global Fund Fund for Women when itcomes to getting decision making into the hands of the people, she said.

Over the last 10 years, GFW has continued to build on the legacy of Murray, whoretired as President in 1996. Today, under the leadership of its second president, KavitaN. Ramdas , the Fund has grown into an organization that has provided $50 million ingrants to 3100 women-led groups in 163 countries.

Responding to new threats around the globe

Whereas Murrays original concept of GFW was that of a small and nimble guerillaoperation that she hoped might put itself out of business in 10 years, the reality is thatGFW doubled in size every year for its first five years and continues to expand itsefforts in response to threats to womens safety, security and freedom around the globe.

I came fairly quickly to realize that small is not always beautiful, said Ramdas. Bornand raised in India, Ramdas came to GFW from the John D. and Catherine T.MacArthur Foundation , where she directed programs in economic development andpopulation. What I saw, coming in ten years after the Global Funds creationwas

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that although we had done a lot, we still had so far to go, women were so far frommainstream status.

Although womens rights are routinely evoked as a global good, the pledges made inUN declarations on the status of women, whether in Cairo in 1994 or Beijing in 1995remain largely words on paper, according to Ramdas. The result is that womensgroups remain under-resourced and outside the scope of international aid and donorprograms and most private philanthropic giving in the US and Europe.

GFW and Mama Cash , based in the Netherlands, are the two largest of only a handfulof publicly supported independent womens foundations that work internationallywith the goal of providing resources to womens organizations in the developingworld. Others doing similar work to provide grant resources include the Unied NationsWomens Fund (UNIFEM), small European funds such as Kwinne na Kwinne inSweden, and WomenKind in the UK.

Spreading the womens fund modelGFW is helping propagate the womens fund model by empowering organizationsaround the world to become funders in their own right. Fundraising is hard, andgroups in the global South are so overly dependent on funding from the North. Werecommitted to seeing shifts, said Nicola (Nicky) McIntyre , GFWs vice president ofdevelopment and communications.

GFW support for an initiative of a local womens group in Mexico, Grupo por losDerechos Humanos por los Mujeres , was instrumental in the creation in 1990 of thefirst feminist fund in the global South, Semillas (seeds ).

Funding from GFW also inspired the efforts of Nepali activist and womens rightsleader, Rita Thapa , to launch Tewa, the Nepal Womens Fund , in Kathmandu in 1996(see related story on page 6). GFW grants have since inspired women from Mongoliaand Ukraine to move forward with funds in their own countries.

An umbrella group was formed in 2000 to link and support the growing number ofwomens funds around the world the International Network of Womens Funds(www.inwf.org ). The majority of the organizations 20 members received key early sup-port from GFW and one, the African Womens Development Fund , is now giving outabout $1 million a year in grants to local womens organizations across the continent.

GFW is also serving as fiscal sponsor for six womens funds in Mexico and CentralAmerica, Mongolia, Nepal, South Africa and the Czech and Slovak Republics that areraising money from diaspora communities in the US and from other donors outsidethe diaspora who wish to support these groups.

Investing in Women: a record-breaking campaignTo continue expanding its ability to address the unmet needs of womens organiza-tions, GFW last November successfully completed a $20 million Investing in WomenCampaign , which drew donations from around the world in amounts ranging from $5to $3.8 million. The effort was co-chaired by US philanthropist-entrepreneurs LaurenePowell Jobs and Diane Jordan Wexler , both members of the GFW board.

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The proceeds were channeled into two board-designated quasi-endowment funds: the$10 million Legacy Fund, the largest endowment ever for an international womensrights organization, and the $10 million Now or Never Fund to make more resourcesimmediately available to women on the frontlines of the struggle against poverty, vio-lence and fundamentalism.

Among the $2.3 million already granted from the new funds are initiatives such as theMano River Womens Peace Network (MARWOPNET), representing 100 organizationsfrom Liberia, Sierra Leone, and Guinea. MARWOPNET, which works to ensure a rolefor women in negotiations to secure long-term security for the region, played a keypart in securing the recent peace accord between the Liberian government and rebels.

Expanding the ranks of donor activistsThe Investing in Women Campaign mobilized thousands of contributors, large andsmall, from the GFWs own grantees in Asia, Africa and Latin America, to major newindividual donors such as social activist and philanthropist Abigail Disney (see relatedstory on next page).

It also served to energize a carefully designed development effort undertaken withthe support of the Sigrid Rausing Trust (www.sigrid-rausing-trust.org ) that hasincreased the number of active individual donors to 15,000 from 3,000 just five yearsago, according to the GFWs McIntyre.

Giving programs are designed to create donor activists, so that even the smallestdonor becomes an ambassador for our organization, said McIntyre. In keeping withthe egalitarian ethos of GFW, donors are listed in the annual report alphabetically, notranked by amount of giving.

Embracing the challenge of growthAs the ranks of supporters continue to swell, Ramdas observed that growth is thesingle largest challenge we face, to sustain the sense of community. Nevertheless,theres incredible excitement at the knowledge that the Global Fund is growing andthat were going to give away more money, she said.

Its the same challenge our world is facing a longing for a sense of community, while being fascinated and intrigued by the global community, said Ramdas. Were bothdrawn to being part of something larger and scared of growing too large. The GlobalFunds solution is to create and sustain a smaller community within this larger globalcontext.

At a time of rapid expansion, the Global Fund for Women has taken a number of stepsto keep its supporters connected and engaged, through regular donor teleconferenceswith GFW leaders and experts; field visits to developing countries for higher-leveldonors; and by means of the Internet. The GFW website, www.globalfundforwomen.org ,for example, offers a full range of resources for hosting a house party on womensissues, and a blog updated regularly by Ramdas.

In recent years, the war on terror and the rise of conservative forces have taken aserious toll on US leadership in the global womens movement, according to Ramdas.

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Complacency has also set in among many in the global North who assume that femi-nist activism of the 1960s and 1970s secured equality for women once and for all.

international consensus of Beijing has been eroded, not only by the usual suspects but by the people the womens movement expected to be its allies, she said.

Looking to the global South for leadershipThere are amazing examples of leadership out there, but most of these are not fromthe West, said Ramdas, citing models such as Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf , President ofLiberia, who embodies a different style of leading based on respect, trust andequality.

Every day, I see examples of women in the global South refusing to accept the statusquo, who bring innovation, creativity, courage and vision a different way to envisionwhat our society could look like, said Ramdas.

To foster such efforts, GFW in May made a grant of $10,000 to an organization formed by a group of women Nobel Prize winners including Iranian lawyer Shirin Ebadi

who have joined forces to push diplomacy, not force, as a means of resolving globalconflicts.

They are not at all shy about saying you cant have peace unless women haveequality, said Ramdas. Thats what keeps us going in the midst of horrible news.

In a time of religious extremism and military conflict, we have to be connectingwomen in the US with struggles in other countries, said Ramdas, noting that for thefirst time, the GFW has begun to make grants to women-led organizations in the USwhose initiatives link women in the global North and South.

We have a unique opportunity to be an amplifier of womens voices here in the US.My commitment is not to let womens voices remain unheard, said Ramdas. Thequestion is how the Global Fund can best respond to the basic needs of the worldspoorest women even as we address the incredible hunger for more meaningful globalconnections that I see among individuals in the US and other wealthy parts of theworld.

Appointed to the Global Fund for Women s Board in 2006, Abigail Disney is founder and president of the Daphne Foundation , which supports grassroots organizations serving someof New York Citys most disadvantaged communities. She has served on the board of theNew York Womens Foundation and supports the White House Project, a womans leader-ship organization, and the Ms. Foundation for Women. Daughter of Roy E. Disney,director emeritus of Walt Disney Co., Abigail Disney is vice chair of Shamrock Holdings, founded in 1978 to manage the Disney family investments. She spoke to Global Giving Matters about how and why she chose to become involved in feminist philanthropy at the global level.

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Feature: A tale of two donors: Global Fund forWomens donor activists


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Serendipity brought Abigail Disney and the Global Fund for Women together in 2005,when Disney received an unexpected call from GFWs president, Kavita Ramdas. As itturned out, Kavita had pushed the wrong button on her speed dial, intending to callsomeone else entirely about an upcoming GFW trip to the Middle East and NorthAfrica, a part of the world where the fund had not previously been active.

My Daphne Foundation work had really matured, my youngest child had startedkindergarten, and the leash was getting longer. I had known about the Global Fund foryears, and Kavita was well respected, said Disney.

So when Ramdas told her about the planned field visit, Disney decided that shewanted to join the trip anyway, despite her lack of previous involvement with GFW, orphilanthropic engagement in the Middle East.

What was stunning, in Morocco and Cairo, sitting in meetings with women, was thatit might as well have been lifted from my work in New York. The women I encoun-tered on the trip felt familiar to me. It felt extremely affirming of what I like to believe that weve developed a similar vocabulary about why grassroots work is so impor-tant, recalls Disney.

I came home thinking not only was this a good investment, but it made sense to beworking locally, nationally and internationally. The Global Fund was the third piece ofthe puzzle. I secretly wanted to join the board; I was hungry for that kind of connec-tion, said Disney.

Disney came to philanthropy as an adult, while a graduate student at ColumbiaUniversity. During this period, she started volunteering at a foundation and an NGO inNew York. When I built my own foundation, I decided to fill the gaps with generaloperating support, and stay with grantees for the long term. There is no substitute for

building a sense of community by spending time with the organization. Its about rela-tionship building, she said.

In April 2006, Disney was appointed to the Global Fund for Womens board. I lovethis board for somewhat selfish reasons, she said. Its incredibly nurturing to myheart to learn from, listen to, and work with women who run girls schools inAfghanistan, or cooperative farms in Latin America.

Disney has been drawn to Africa four times in the last two years, most recently on atrip to Liberia with Swanee Hunt , founder and chair of Women Waging Peace, and amember of The Synergos Institutes Global Philanthropists Circle. On a visit to arefugee camp, Disney was impressed by a project run by a Sierra Leonian woman.Thinking that it would be useful to put her in touch with the Global Fund for Women,Disney realized she was already connected-as an advisor-and was handing out GFW

brochures to visitors.

Following her trip to the Middle East last year, Disney made a $1 million gift to GFWs$20 million Investing in Women Campaign. It seemed really important to step up forwomen with big gifts. Its time we have an enormous amount of money in this gener-ation. I fund women because everybody wins. People like me need to set an exampleand dig deep, Disney said.

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Rita Thapa , a Nepalese social activist, former GFW board chair, and Ashoka Fellow, chairelast years Ripples of Change fundraising campaign, which reached out to more than 2,000of the grassroots women-led organizations among GFWs international grantees. With support from GFW, Thapa founded Tewa, the Nepal Womens Fund in 1996, and in 2001established Nagarik Awaz (Citizens Voice), an organization that promotes peacebuildingand reconciliation in Nepal. She spoke to GGM while attending the annual conference of

Grantmakers without Borders in California, where she was keynote speaker.I was from a traditional, privileged background, and had an education, which wasntavailable for every woman in my country. As I grew up, I knew that even despite being

born to privilege, I still suffered as woman. That drew me into this world of activism,and I just jumped in whenever I saw a gap, said Thapa.

In 1990, Thapa was working in Nepal with a local NGO on the issue of trafficking ofwomen and girls, but in looking for support for the project, learned that donorsworking in Nepal didnt understand our needs. She decided to apply to GFW, whichhad created a focus on trafficking, for a grant, and quickly received funding. Thapawas invited to become a member of the Global Funds international advisory council,

and to share her experience as an activist on these issues.The idea for Tewa was born during the historic 1995 World Conference on Women inBeijing. Thapa was preparing a presentation for a GFW panel called Funding OurFuture, and had been reflecting on the development needs of Nepal. It was very dra-matic, she recalls. At the end of my seven-minute presentation, I said something like,given the situation, I think I will quit my job and put together this organization.

Thats exactly what I did with three kids, and as a widow. But this thing, it was justlike being impregnated I had to give birth! Thapa, then employed by UNIFEM, lefther job to devote herself full-time, and on a volunteer basis, to Tewa, the NepalWomens Fund.

When she stepped down as president of Tewa in 2001, Thapa handed over to her suc-cessor a vibrant organization with a staff of 12, a team of more than 250 fundraisingvolunteers, a local donor base of over 1,500 Nepalis and a list of grantees that includedmore than 150 womens groups throughout Nepal, most of them rural. All this wasaccomplished in a country where asking local people directly for money to supportefforts to strengthen women was completely new.

What weve been really good at is fundraising in our own local context. Doing Tewawas a way of making sure that women get organized and stay organized. Enhancingthe voice and visibility of women is critical, said Thapa.

Thapa says that she planned to take a break after leaving Tewa, but events in Nepalintervened. In 2001, the death of the King and other members of the royal family at thehands of the Crown Prince set off a cascade of violent reprisals and a rapid decline ineconomic and political security. I knew I had to teach myself to do peace work. I hadno idea how to do it, but without peace, there can be no development, she observed.

The organization that she founded in 2001, Nagarik Awaz, assists some of the thou-sands of people displaced by the most recent conflict in Nepal, particularly youth. Itswork has been replicated in numerous locations in Nepal.

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Whats happening in Nepal right now has happened because of neglect, poverty andexclusion it really surged up. We are poised at a place where we have to rise on thesetides, or else well crash, said Thapa, pointing to the global experience with naturaldisasters in recent years.

The analogy with the world has already been demonstrated with the tsunamis andHurricane Katrina. Politically or environmentally, we have to be able to see the worldas one, and touch on issues of equity and justice, or well all be swept away.

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Feature: AU Cairo home to new center on MiddleEast philanthropyAs the American University at Cairo (AUC www.aucegypt.edu ) prepares to occupy anew 260-acre campus in a suburb outside of Cairo in 2007, it has launched the John D.Gerhart Center for Philanthropy and Civic Engagement to consolidate university activi-

ties aimed at engaged citizenship and service, and to promote philanthropy in the Arabregion, particularly indigenous giving.

The new center is named for AUCs former president, the late John D. Gerhart . It wasunder Gerharts tenure that AUCs programs were expanded for students to learn skillsand concepts of civic engagement, and to participate in a wide range of community-

based activities.

We want to prepare our students and the entire AUC community to engage in publicservice, for the public good, Barbara Ibrahim , director of the Gerhart Center, said atthe inaugural event in March. We believe that by getting students outside the libraryand outside of classrooms to actually do some learning in the community, observing

and interacting with the real world, they will graduate from AUC not only better pre-pared for livelihood and profession, but also ready to dedicate a lifelong commitmentto improving society

At a pre-launch symposium in Cairo last fall, Ibrahim noted that a trend towardrenewed Arab philanthropy seems to be coming of age, ready to take a next step fromscattered exemplary models to a vibrant movement. Ibrahim said that a small groupof Arab educators and philanthropists had been discussing how best to support andenergize this trend, and AUC offered to become one of the nodes for enhanced Arabphilanthropy and civic engagement.

AUC and other universities in the Arab world are uniquely situated to marshal the

forces needed to re-energize Arab philanthropy and community engagement,according to Ibrahim. To accomplish this aim, the Gerhart Center plans to work collab-oratively to support existing local and regional institutions and encourage new initia-tives. The goal is to expand Arab philanthropy based on principles of developmentand social justice, as a means to invigorate civic engagement of NGOs, corporationsand citizens of the region, she said.

The Centers start-up activities will focus on the promotion of regional philanthropyfor social change, and enhanced teaching and research for civic engagement. Among


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the efforts planned are a visiting fellows program and short-term residencies forEgyptian civil society activities, as well as distinguished visiting scholars and practi-tioners from outside the region. Within the university community, eradication of illit-eracy a critical barrier to civic participation is a top priority for the center.

What we hope to see happen is that in partnerships in the communities where wework there will be joint definitions of problems, rather than AUC deciding here at thispodium what we want to address. ( The Daily Star-Egypt , March 13, 2006; InternationalService News , April 30, 2006)

Global Development Alliance marks five years of public-private partnershipsThe US Agency for International Development s Global Development Alliance (GDA) has

been converted into an independent office, reflecting significant advances in main-streaming the GDA business model within the agency, said Dan Runde , Director ofGDA. The former secretariat is now known as the Office of Global DevelopmentAlliances. GDA marked its fifth anniversary with the publication of a report profiling21 of its successful public-private partnerships, including a collaboration spearheaded

by Colombian philanthropist Maria Eugenia Garcs and facilitated by The SynergosInstitute . The alliance forged by Garcs, a member of Synergos Global PhilanthropistsCircle , is aimed at helping Colombians move toward peace and reconciliation byadapting the restorative justice model pioneered in South Africa, Northern Ireland, andother post-conflict situations. Since its creation five years ago to mobilize newresources for global development, GDA has obligated $1.5 billion to more than 400public-private alliances around the world and leveraged more than $4.7 billion in con-tributions from its partners. Through these alliances, GDA has brought new privatepartners to the development table, including corporations, foundations, universities,and faith-based organizations. The report, The Global Development Alliance: PublicPrivate Alliances for Transformational Development , is available on the GDA websitewww.usaid.gov/our_work/global_partnerships/gda .

Recent developments in philanthropy in China

...new giving circles to support grassroots organizations in ChinaGrantmakers Without Borders (Gw/oB www.gwob.net ) and The Clarence Foundation

(www.theclarencefoundation.org) have joined forces to create new giving circlesfocused on philanthropic support to China, beginning in September 2006 in SanFrancisco and Chicago. Members will pool their funds and consider a portfolio ofgrassroots organizations based in China that are addressing issues of the environment,HIV/AIDS, education, and other interests of the group. Participants, to include indi-vidual and institutional donors, will engage in hands-on learning led by Gw/oB andClarence Foundation staff and a range of expert guest speakers. The new giving circles

build on a series of learning events organized by Gw/oB in Chicago, New York and San

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Global Giving RoundupOverviews of best practices around

the world andlinks to learn more

about them

Links to websites with more details are available

at the online edition of Global Giving Matters at

www.globalgivingmatters.org


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Francisco. For more information on the giving circles, contact Marc Manashil at +1 510-384-7188/[email protected] .

...getting the word out about philanthropy in ChinaGrantmakers Without Borders s focus on China was highlighted at its Sixth AnnualConference on Global Social Change Philanthropy in San Mateo, CA, June 8-10. Theevent featured a session exclusively on grantmaking in China, and workshops onHIV/AIDS, US policy and other topics of relevance to China grantmakers. In addition,a new online publication, China Philanthropy News , has been launched by Gw/oB as aservice to grantmakers and donors interested in philanthropic engagement with China.To suggest a posting or subscribe to China Philanthropy News , email [email protected] .

Bank of China launches first Chinese SRI fundIn other news from the region, the Bank of China has established that countrys firstsocially responsible investment (SRI) fund, the Sustainable Growth Equity Fund . Inmanaging the fund, Wu Jun , Bank of Chinas International Investment Manager, who

also heads the banks Sustainable Investment division, said he will look beyond finan-cial performance to include sustainability of the business model, corporate gover-nance, corporate strategy and the attitude towards social responsibility as investmentcriteria. Robert Rubinstein , CEO of Triple Bottom Line Consulting , organizer of anannual SRI conference in Asia, noted that Chinas growing need for energy and otherresources poses unprecedented challenges to sustainable development. Rubinstein saidthat SRI was essential to drive as much of Chinas growth as possible into more energyefficient and sustainable technologies and production. ( CSRwire , May 24, 2006)

Johnson-Sirleaf, Turner to be honored at University for a Night 2006Liberian President Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf and the UN Foundation s Ted Turner will behonored at Synergos University for a Night event in New York on October 12 with theDavid Rockefeller Bridging Leadership Awards . Each year, University for a Night con-venes leaders from around the world from business, government and civil society to explore ways to create systemic solutions to poverty, inequity, conflict, environ-mental degradation and other critical problems. Mrs. Johnson-Sirleaf, who is the firstwoman to be elected to head of state in Africa, and Mr. Turner will be joined in a ple-nary discussion by E. Neville Isdell , Chairman and CEO of The Coca-Cola Company.Following the plenary, they and 50 other global leaders will help lead the discussionsat small tables over dinner about particular global challenges and initiatives. JPMorganis Founding Sponsor of University for a Night and Marcos de Moraes is EventUnderwriter. For more information visit www.universityforanight.org .

International Fundraising Congress coming in OctoberThe International Fundraising Conference (IFC) is the worlds leading event for seniorfundraisers, attracting 800 participants from more than 45 countries, and offering thelatest thinking, trends and development in the field. The 26th IFC, to be held October17-20 at the NH Leeuwenhorst Hotel, the Netherlands, will feature 113 new masterclasses ranging from running integrated major donor campaigns to how to approachfoundations. The conference will showcase 50 world-class speakers including Karen

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Osborne , Bernard Ross , Tony Elischer , Kay Sprinkel Grace , Stephen Pidgeon , RichardRadcliffe , Simone Joyaux and more. Contact [email protected] or telephone at+44 (0) 20 7065 0802.

Buffett and Gates join philanthropic forcesThe month of June saw announcements from two of the worlds most successful andinfluential business leaders that rocked the field of global philanthropy.

First, Bill Gates , 50, announced on June 15 that he was stepping down from daily oper-ations at Microsoft to devote more time to the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation(www.gatesfoundation.org ).

A little more than a week later, Berkshire Hathaways Warren Buffett , 75, said he wasdonating the bulk of his $44 billion fortune 85% of his Berkshire stock to the Billand Melinda Gates Foundation and to previously existing foundations established byhis children and his late wife, Susan Thompson Buffett .

The majority of the gift, about $31 billion, will go to the Bill and Melinda Gates

Foundation, whose principals are close friends of Buffetts. Buffett will start transfer-ring the money in July; Berkshires stock price on the date of each gift will determineits dollar value. His 2006 gift to the foundation, 500,000 shares, is worth about $1.5 bil-lion, which is roughly equivalent to the Gates Foundations current annual grant-making.

Buffetts announcement came as a surprise in light of his previously stated intention towait until his death to give his fortune away. After his wife passed away in 2004,Buffett began to reevaluate his philanthropic options, he said in a television appear-ance with Bill and Melinda Gates that aired shortly after he made his decision public.

I thought shed outlive me and shed make the big decisions, Buffett told interviewer

Charlie Rose. I like immediate feedback I walk into an ice cream store and I want atriple dip right away. In philanthropy, you have to take a longer view. I thought Id beterrible at philanthropy. In the Gates Foundation, Buffett said, I had a solutionstaring me in the face.

Gates said that he and Buffett had been discussing the possibility of a philanthropicpartnership for the last year and a half. Although Buffett will become a trustee of theGates Foundation, he said that he prefers to leave the decisions about how to allocatehis gift to the current leadership of the foundation Bill and Melinda Gates, Bill GatesSr. , and CEO Patty Stonesifer .

Media coverage to date has focused on the staggering amounts of money involved on

the worlds second wealthiest man giving his fortune away to what was already thelargest foundation ever, run by the globes richest man and his wife.

In fact, Buffetts commitment is the largest in philanthropic history. The previousrecord was held by Bill and Melinda Gates themselves, who donated more than $29 bil-lion in Microsoft assets to enlarge their foundation.

Still to be determined, however, is the most effective way for the Gates Foundation toput its dramatically expanded grantmaking power to use. The announcement of

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Buffetts record-breaking benevolence triggered a flood of commentary and advice onthis topic from experts in the fields of business, philanthropy and international devel-opment.

Mark R. Kramer , co-founder of the US-based Center for Effective Philanthropy(www.effectivephilanthropy.com ), cautioned against equating Buffetts unprecedentedgenerosity with immediate social impact.

The sudden, massive and highly publicized gift offers a sharp contrast to the slow,complicated and unheralded work that the Gates Foundation must now undertake todeliver the benefits to society that are assumed to flow automatically from such munifi-cence, observed Kramer, commenting in the Chronicle of Philanthropy.

In announcing the partnership, Bill and Melinda Gates said their foundation would usethe expanded funding to continue along the lines of work it is already engaged in accelerating and deepening support for global health and education in the US ratherthan taking on new causes.

Some of the funding is also likely to support the foundations recently announced

Global Development program, rolled out in April, aimed at countering extremepoverty through improvements in agricultural productivity and access to financialservices in the developing world. The foundation also expects to step up its efforts toget governments more involved in philanthropic partnerships, Bill Gates said.

At a news conference in New York on June 26, Bill Gates said it was another contempo-rary titan of business, Ted Turner , who had set the stage by challenging the worldswealthiest citizens to give back to society. Turner himself set a notable example in 1998,when he gave $1 billion in Time Warner stock to create the United Nations Foundation .

Asked whether other would-be philanthropists should follow Buffetts example andchannel their wealth into the Gates Foundation, Bill Gates demurred, explaining that

were not set up to accept money from others. Displaying his characteristic entrepre-neurial spirit, however, Gates added that if there were enough interest among wealthyindividuals in directly joining forces with the Gates Foundation as Buffett did, welllook at what we can do to set things up. ( Fortune , June 25, 2006; Chronicle of Philanthropy , June 29, 2006; The Charlie Rose Show , June 26, 2006; The GatesFoundation)

Whats new in microfinance...

. . .Gates Foundation gives $1.46 million to Unitus for microfinanceinnovationsThe Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation (www.gatesfoundation.org ) has awarded $1.46 mil-lion to Unitus (www.unitus.com ) a nonprofit organization that uses a venture capitalmodel to dramatically accelerate the growth of microfinance institutions (MFIs).Unitus, founded by Mike Murray , a member of The Synergos Institutes GlobalPhilanthropists Circle, will use the grant to identify potential innovations in the effi-ciency of the microfinance business model. Under the three-year project, Unitus willwork with four of its MFI partners in India and Latin America to create improvementsin operational and financial efficiency that can be shared across the industry. Sylvia

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Matthews , president of the Global Development Program at the Gates Foundation, saidthe foundation expects that the MFIs Unitus chooses for the project will achieve a 10%gain in operational efficiency within the grant period. As of May 2006, Unitus, based inRedmond, WA and Bangalore, India, had nine partners worldwide serving more than679,000 poor clients. ( Puget Sound Business Journal , May 22, 2006)

...Unitus, Michael & Susan Dell Foundation team up on microfinancein IndiaThe Michael & Susan Dell Foundation (www.msdf.org ) and Unitus Equity Fund, L.P ., aprivate equity fund formed by Unitus, announced May 18 that they will invest jointlyin Ujjivan Financial Services Private Ltd ., an Indian microfinance institution. Unitus willhave a 24% ownership stake; the foundation a 13.8% stake; and the BellwetherMicrofinance Fund , which had earlier invested in Ujjivan, a 12.6% stake. The combinedfunds will provide Ujjivan with the capital it needs to reach more than 600,000 bor-rowers by 2011. Microfinance in India is still mainly a rural phenomenon, with only ahandful of MFIs providing services to the urban poor. Ujjivan, based in Bangalore, fillsthis gap by providing financial services to economically active urban poor people, par-ticularly women. (Michael & Susan Dell Foundation news release, May 18, 2006)

Investors to get rating tool for microfinance fundsBelief in the market strength of microfinance was further demonstrated with theunveiling in May of a rating tool for the industry that is backed by the Bill & MelindaGates Foundation (www.gatesfoundation.org), the Omidyar Network(www.omidyar.net ), and the Gray Ghost Microfinance Fund (www.grayghostfund.com ).This rating tool is critically important in advancing microfinance as a distinct assetclass because it is the first attempt to stop comparing apples and oranges, which iswhat investors have been forced to do when shopping for microfinance investment

products, saidDavid Sattherthwaite

, developer ofMicroCapital

(www.microcapital.org

)a web-based information clearinghouse on microfinance. MicroRate(www.microrate.com ) a company that evaluates microfinance institutions, has been atwork for several years on developing a rating tool. A recent survey of the industry byMicroRate found 59 funds or investment vehicles that invest in microfinance institu-tions in developing countries. MicroRate is expected to hit the market by mid-summer2006; the rating tool will offer brief descriptive reports on each microfinance invest-ment vehicle that include risk profiles and geographic distribution, and will measureeach fund on a range of performance indicators. (SocialFunds.com, May 24, 2006)

Chicago Global Donors conference connects local and global actionThe Chicago Global Donors Network (www.chicagoglobaldonors.org ) hosted its ThirdAnnual Conference on International Giving: Chicago in the World The World inChicago on June 26-27. The event brought together a high-level group of internationalleaders, diaspora donors and other experts to discuss how to act both globally andlocally to impact some of the most challenging issues of the day. Keynoting the confer-ence was Manuel Arango , a leader and pioneer in Mexican philanthropy and corporatesocial responsibility, who established the Mexican Center for Philanthropy (CEMEFI www.cemefi.org ). Arango is the co-founder of a national retail chain in Mexico, and

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founder and chairman of a Mexican real estate development company. Conference par-ticipants met with Mexican diaspora donors and learned about the immigrant experi-ence in Chicago in a visit to Casa Michoacan, part of a network of diaspora giving cir-cles organized to support their home state of Michoacan, Mexico. Discussion groupsprovided philanthropists, activists and international experts a chance to exchangeinformation on global challenges such as refugees, climate change and a range of other

pressing concerns. The conference closed with a talk from Gayle Smith of the Center forAmerican Progress, and Mark Hanis , founder of Genocide Intervention Network.Hanis, inspired by the history of his grandparents, all of whom were holocaust sur-vivors, began the Genocide Information Network as a senior in college, frustrated by alack of action from the US Government against the genocide in the Sudan. WhereManuel Arango demonstrated philanthropic leadership from the perspective of a suc-cessful business entrepreneur, Hanis showed that personal commitment and youthfulenergy can also contribute to reaching philanthropic goals. The event was sponsored

by LaSalle Bank ABN AMRO , The Boeing Company , Quarles & Brady and the globalhealth care company Abbott .

Alliance unveils new look; June issue spotlights donors and learningThe June 2006 issue of Alliance (www.alliancemagazine.org ) introduces the magazinesredesigned format as well as several new features: an opinion column by Bruce Sieversand commentary by David Bonbright on selected articles in each issue. With a specialtheme of donors as learning organizations guest editors Jenny Hyatt and AllanKaplan set out their ideal of a learning organization and suggest that many funders are

failing to live up to it. In response, a number of donors describe the ways in whichtheir organizations seek to benefit from their experiences. Contributors include theBernard Van Leer Foundation , the Carpathian Foundation , South Africas Social Change

Assistance Trust , Oxfam and IBM.

Another contributor to the June issue, Elizabeth (Lizzie) Eder Zobel , founder of thePhilippine Sa Aklat Sisikat Foundation (www.readerstransform.com ), shares herinsights on learning from the grantees point of view. Established in 2001, the founda-tion aims to improve literacy and instill a love of reading among primary grade stu-dents in the Philippines. Zobel, an entrepreneur, civic leader and member of SynergosGlobal Philanthropists Circle, explains to Alliance that the continuing success of herfoundation depends on constant self-questioning and a willingness to learn about theneeds of its beneficiaries and to re-engineer itself to meet them. This attitude, she

believes, is one that donors would do well to imitate.

The benefits of home-grown CSR in Latin AmericaThe tools and methodology of corporate social responsibility (CSR), created in theglobal North, are not always a good fit for the challenges facing business and society inLatin America, observes Stephan Schmidheiny , founder and honorary chairman of theWorld Business Council for Sustainable Development . CSRs foreign roots mean it is

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Activities, websites and other

cutting-edge information for

global givers

Links to websites with more details are available

at the online edition of Global Giving Matters at

www.globalgivingmatters.org

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not as appropriate for the region as it could and should be, said Schmidheiny, writingin the Spring 2006 issue of The Journal of Corporate Citizenship. Wealthy Northernerslook southwards and see rainforests and biodiversity [as CSR issues]; thoughtfulSoutherners look around them and see poverty, poor education, bad housing, scarcehealthcare and all the rest of that grim list, he said. His views are based on his experi-ence with the Latin American holding company he created, Grupo Nueva . Schmidheiny

recently placed all of the companys stock in a trust fund so that he could promote sus-tainable development in the region.

The key challenge for the region, and the developing world in general, is the creationof a home-grown, meaningful form of CSR that addresses local issues and improvessociety, while also strengthening governments capacity. While noting a growinginterest in CSR on the part of Latin American companies, Schmidheiny said few werewalking the talk by publishing sustainability or corporate citizenship reports, or sub-mitting to external verification. A notable exception is found in Brazil, the regionalpowerhouse of CSR where CSR leader Ethos Institute (www.ethos.org.br ) has pub-lished CSR reporting guidelines followed by some 500 Brazilian companies. Experiencehas shown that companies that are socially engaged in Latin America are seeing arange of benefits, from greater productivity, efficiency and morale, to the acquisition ofimproved business intelligence.

The next frontier is the establishment of a business-enabling environment by govern-ment so that companies can play a development role in the South as they have in theNorth. Schmidheinys article is available at www.wbcsd.org .

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Global Giving Matters aims to present information on best practices and innovations inphilanthropy and social investment around the world. We encourage you to send us:

Ideas about issues or people you would like to learn more about Examples of your own philanthropy Comments about this issue.Write to us at [email protected] .

Global Giving Matters does not present solicitations of support for particularinitiatives or organizations.

Your Ideas Wanted

The World Economic Forum91-93 route de la CapiteCH-1223 Cologny/GenevaSwitzerlandtel +41 (22) 869-1212fax +41 (22) 786-2744www.weforum.org

The Synergos Institute51 Madison Avenue21st FloorNew York, NY 10010USAtel +1 212-447-8111fax +1 212-447-8119www.synergos.org

Rockefeller Philanthropy Advisors437 Madison AvenueNew York, NY 10022-7001USAtel +1 212-812-4330fax + 1 -212-812-4335www.rockpa.org

Global Giving Matters May-July 2006 Issue 26

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