Jonas Philanthropies Expands Impact By Moving from Funding Tree Growing, to Funding Additional Nature-based Solutions 

Recently published “Primer” for Funders discusses how to center equity in Nature-based Solutions (NbS) funding

NEW YORK, July 2024 – Jonas Philanthropies, a nonprofit dedicated to investing where it matters most, is deepening its commitment to climate resilience with the announcement of a trust-based initiative of $1.5M in funding to support Nature-based Solutions led by women and frontline communities. For their first tranche of funding, they’ve partnered with Home Planet Fund which was recently launched with seed funding from Patagonia, to source some initial grant partners.

“We know the data behind how using a trust-based and equity centered lens also equates to meaningful carbon sequestration. We are excited to have Jonas Philanthropies as one of our initial funders; their support has translated to Home Planet Fund on-the-ground partners protecting 1.5M square KM or 1% of Earth’s total land area,” says Dilafruz Khonikboyeva, Home Planet Fund’s Inaugural Executive Director.

The total $1.5M of the funding will be deployed between now and 2025. They are excited to announce their first tranche of funding deployed in 2024, as well as the release of a 28-page Nature-Based Solutions (NbS): An Equity-Centered Approach Primer.  The Primer strives to help other funders better understand the nuances and complexity of Nature-based Solutions.

Nature-based Solutions (NbS) are actions that protect, manage, and restore ecosystems to address societal challenges, while providing human well-being and biodiversity benefits. Jonas Philanthropies, through strategic grantmaking, aims to support interconnected NbS focusing on six underfunded areas: Conservation Hydrology, Human Needs, Human Health, Rewilding, Leveraging Additional Capital, and Social Enterprises. Their approach will fund grassroots, frontline communities, yielding significant benefits for both human and planetary health.

This funding commitment comes after their successful completion of the Trees for Climate Health initiative launched in 2019, which funded $2.2M (including $1M pledged by Jonas Philanthropies + an additional $1.2M from other funders) towards tree growing. The initiative prioritized the right trees, the right places and the right communities to create maximum social, economic, and ecological benefit. The initiative funded over 60 tree-growing projects in more than 34 unique countries, with over 52% of projects led by Black and Indigenous leadership. Projects promoted food security, biodiversity, and multi-functionality of species, and had a proven track record of high survival rates. Utilizing a data-driven approach, the initiative included a focus on growing species of trees with meaningful carbon sequestration rates to combat climate change. The funders are maintaining relationship with projects that received funding to understand benefits of the funding and challenges that these incredible leaders continue to face in implementing solutions to the climate crisis.

Jonas Philanthropies is proud to announce the first tranche of their NbS funding deployed to three organizations: 

Projects in this funding tranche range from women-led diversified orchard stewardship for food security and climate mitigation in both the Amazon and one of the world’s most conflict-affected areas, to sustainable protein production by a leader of the Asháninka one of the largest indigenous tribes in Brazil, to wildfire prevention and management in a 5,000 acre reserve outside of one the largest cities in central America.

“It is core to the Jonas Philanthropies ethos to support the leadership of frontline communities and do so in a way that does not create outsized burden on that leadership to produce cumbersome reporting and verification, but to allow them to lead in taking action and making meaningful change on the ground in their communities,” said Lendri Purcell, Vice President, Jonas Philanthropies and Founder, Trees for Climate Health.  

“It is hard for me to imagine a climate solution more promising for all humanity than funding indigenous and local communities who hold the key to building climate resilience. In the coming years, billions of dollars will be invested in NbS. We need ‘no BS’ NbS to ensure that as much of those funds as possible flow towards holistic solutions. It is an honor to work with funders like Jonas Philanthropies and Home Planet Fund to support community-led climate justice projects,” said Erin Axelrod, Partner at LIFT Economy and Project Director, Jonas Philanthropies’ Climate Health. Interested projects can apply for funding here.

About Jonas Philanthropies Climate Health 

Climate Health, a program of Jonas Philanthropies, is a powerful initiative of partner funders and collaborators who are working to address the impact of climate change by funding Nature-based Solutions through projects led by women and frontline communities. The program focuses funding in six strategic underfunded areas of the larger NBS umbrella: Conservation Hydrology, Human Needs, Human Health, Rewilding, Leveraging Additional Capital, and Social Enterprises. This initiative from Jonas Philanthropies takes an evidence-based, data-driven approach to funding climate justice projects, identifying the right approaches, the right places, and the right communities to create maximum social, economic and ecological benefit. 

About Jonas Philanthropies 

Jonas Philanthropies is transforming our communities for the better by investing where it matters most, in solutions that can be scaled for the greatest impact. Its programs address high-need issues and audiences with high-impact solutions: promoting leadership in nursing and veterans healthcare, preventing and treating low vision and blindness, protecting our children’s environmental health, and taking care of our climate. For more information about Jonas Philanthropies, visit jonasphilanthropies.org, follow us on Twitter, or like us on Facebook. 

Contact 
LIFT Economy
www.lifteconomy.com
Erin Axelrod, (707) 931-1293, erin (at) lifteconomy (dot) com