| Brazil | Environment and Development
Brazil’s Amazon River basin is a region of extreme poverty, inequality, agrarian conflict and environmental degradation. Our work there supports initiatives to alleviate poverty and preserve the environment in the most critical area of the Deforestation Belt, where urbanization and timber cutting are rampant. We help communities address these issues by supporting the efforts of traditional peoples—including rubber-tappers, riverside communities, peasants, indigenous peoples and rural Afro-descendants (“quilombolas”)—to protect their land, use natural resources to improve their livelihoods, and participate in the policymaking process related to land use. |
| China | Environment and Development
The goal of the Environment and Development program in China is to support innovative individuals and institutions to address needs and build assets in poor and marginalized resource-dependent communities. These assets include secure tenure rights, cultural values, shared knowledge, strong organizations and effective networks. Our grant making supports programs to build more secure livelihoods for rural residents; to contribute to environmental sustainability and social well-being; and to promote community development approaches that reduce poverty, protect resources and increase social and gender equity. |
| Eastern Africa | Environment and Economic Development
Our work recognizes the strong connections among natural resources, the environment and the economic health of communities. We fund efforts to make conservation and markets work and pay off for rural, poor and marginalized groups, particularly women and youth, who are dependent on natural resources. Our support, including grants to development finance instruments, encourages communities to learn and benefit from management techniques and the conservation of natural resources. |
| Global | Environment and Development
Our work focuses on the interdependence of human well-being and the health of the environment. In many places, the most vulnerable, marginalized and poor households are concentrated in rural communities that rely on natural resources for food, livelihoods, housing and health. But low-income people often lack a voice in the management of vital natural resources and, at the same time, are disproportionately exposed to toxic pollutants and other environmental hazards. We work to support natural resource management and environmental justice strategies that help poor communities overcome these challenges, as well as the economic exclusion and social marginalization that underlie them. |
| India, Nepal and Sri Lanka | Environment and Development
We support efforts to integrate environmental conservation with strategies to improve livelihoods, create new economic opportunities and increase social equity. Our grantees help resource-dependent and marginalized communities to build social networks, increase their capacity to manage resources, secure resource rights and use various strategies to ensure long-term equitable access to natural resources. |
| Indonesia | Environment and Development
We support efforts that promote equitable access and sustainable use of natural resources to enhance environmental quality, improve livelihoods and create more just systems of natural resources management. We seek to enhance the role, voice and choices of local communities in the development, management and stewardship of natural resources. To establish a sustainable resource-management strategy that helps eradicate poverty and meet environmental and social justice goals, our work links rural communities with government, nongovernment, academic and commercial-sector institutions. |
| Mexico and Central America | Environment and Development
We promote the sustainable use of natural resources in rural southern Mexico and Central America. Our work focuses on forestry and tourism activities that can simultaneously provide jobs and income, protect the environment and build healthy communities. We are particularly interested in indigenous and Afro-descendant communities. Most of our funding goes toward efforts to improve policies, institutions, understanding and training related to these issues, rather than supporting field activities in specific locations. |
| Russia | Environmental Justice and Sustainable Community Development
We seek to empower local communities to assert control over their natural resources and environment in ways that balance environmental restoration and resilience with community development. Our work in this field focuses on two primary areas: support for projects that ensure that communities are included in the development and implementation of natural resource management strategies; and support for efforts to create sustainable livelihoods in rural, forest-based communities. |
| Southern Africa | Environment and Economic Development
Our grants in this area seek to improve the economic prosperity of poor and marginalized people. One focus is on development finance to deliver a range of financial services to the poor. The other is on community-based natural resource management work. Our grants help to improve access and control of natural resource assets at the community level, and they support local efforts to market and add value to these natural assets—often through natural resource-based enterprises. |
| United States | Environment and Development
Our work focuses on the interdependence of human well-being and the health of the environment. In many places, the most vulnerable, marginalized and poor households are concentrated in rural communities that rely on natural resources for food, livelihoods, housing and health. But low-income people often lack a voice in the management of vital natural resources and, at the same time, are disproportionately exposed to toxic pollutants and other environmental hazards. We work to support natural resource management and environmental justice strategies that help poor communities overcome these challenges, as well as the economic exclusion and social marginalization that underlie them. |
| Vietnam and Thailand | Environment and Development
Ford grantees are promoting sustainable wealth creation in disadvantaged communities that depend on natural resources. This involves helping poor people generate more income from the markets in which they sell products and services. We also support work to promote security of land tenure. |