Environmental Grants Awarded

At The Overbrook Foundation’s Summer Board Meeting, our Board of Directors approved eight grants to be awarded through the Foundation’s Environmental Program. 

All eight of these organizations have been previously supported by the Foundation, and with these grants, the Directors have renewed their commitment to the organizations and their missions.

The Overbrook Foundation will award $35,000 to Earthworks for its "No Dirty Gold Campaign." The campaign is a market-based effort aimed at bring responsible practices to the mining industry. Its successes include preventing the opening of a gold mine in Yellowstone National Park and helping to stop oil development in Yosemite National Park.

 

The Environmental Investigations Agency (EIA) will receive $55,000 for its efforts in reporting on, and helping to enforce, the Lacey Act. The Act forbids trade in wildlife, fish, and plants that have been illegally taken, possessed, transported or sold, and allows for civil and criminal prosecution for such violations. EIA will use the grant award primarily to bolster investigations related to illegal wood sourcing in Latin America.

$70,000 will be awarded to Fundacion Cordillera Tropical for its work with Ecuadorian communities in the area near southern Sangay National Park. The Foundation is dedicated to empowering local communities to sustainably manage natural resources, and will use the grant money to develop and implement payment for ecological services in the Dudas watershed region. 

The Rainforest Action Network (RAN) will receive $40,000 for its campaign to convince Cargill - a multinational production and marketing company - to adopt stricter palm oil safeguards by October 2013. RAN hopes that such adoption will convince other companies to follow suit, and thus help reduce the high social and environmental harms of the current palm oil trade, especially in areas of tropical forests.

Clean Production Action (CAP), an entrepreneurial NGO, will use the $60,000 grant from the Overbrook Foundation to scale-up its GreenScreen (GS) and BizNGO programs.  GS is currently the leading application for identifying safer chemicals, and BizNGO is part of a multi-stakeholder effort to increase sustainability and safety in the chemical, plastics, and materials sectors.

$20,000 will be awarded to the Green Press Initiative (GPI), an initiative committed to reducing the environmental impacts of the paper and pulp industries. The award will be spent with a view to reaching the 2012 treatise paper-related benchmarks of 30% recycled/ 20% Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) certified (the industry is now at 24% and 16%, respectively). GPI will also continue its partnership with the Environmental Paper Network (EPN) to finalize a carbon accounting methodology.

The Los Angeles Alliance for a New Economy (LAANE) will receive a $35,000 grant for its "Don't Waste LA" project. This initiative aims to transform the waste and recycling industry in LA and other cities in LA County and create a model for sustainable waste management for the U.S., and is part of LAANE's broader efforts to transform conditions in underserved neighborhoods. The award will also be spent on developing a competitive franchise policy that maximizes recycling and establishes safety, labor and environmental standards for hauling and processing facilities.

Finally, $20,000 will be awarded to the Product Stewardship Institute (PSI) for its efforts to bring together diverse stakeholders in the product stewardship arena and create a more comprehensive and effective set of policies and initiatives.

 

In all, the Overbrook Foundation’s Environmental Program, as directed by the Board, awarded a total of $360,000 in grants.  

As always, you can learn more about these grantees on their websites by clicking on their names in this post. Congratulations to these grantees and we look forward to their work promoting rainforest protection and sustainable consumption in the year to come!