To Protect the Seas from Rising Threats, a Top Grantmaker Looks to Indonesia
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islands in the endangered banda Sea in Indonesia. Fabio Lamanna/shutterstock
As our oceans face mounting threats like climate change, unsustainable fishing and pollution, innovative nonprofits and funders are on the move. Recently, we’ve checked in with some heavily invested marine foundations like Bloomberg Philanthropies and the Waitt Foundation. Marine planning and the creation of marine protected areas (MPAs) in countries around the world has emerged as a popular strategy. Margaret A. Cargill Philanthropies (MACP), one of the largest grantmaking entities in the U.S., also funds marine issues, including MPA development.
A Layered Funding Stream
MACP consists of two foundations: the Margaret A. Cargill Foundation (MACF) and the Anne Ray Foundation (ARF). ARF only funds a predetermined set of grantees, while MACF has an evolving grantmaking program (though it doesn’t accept unsolicited requests). The two entities combined hold about $6.8 billion. MACP gave away more than $275 million in 2018. This included close to $47 million for its environmental programs.
MACP’s marine funding falls within the coastal ecosystems branch of its environmental giving, to which it devoted about $12 million in 2018. Both MACF and ARF support MACP’s coastal ecosystems work—ARF through its designated environmental domain grantee, the Nature Conservancy (TNC), and MACP to other grantees including Conservation International, Wildlife Conservation Society and World Wildlife Fund (WWF) and local community groups.
Here, we look at how MACP carries out marine-centric giving, and also at a funding collaborative it’s part of that has spent tens of millions on marine conservation in Indonesia. While not a focus of this story, MACP also carries out funding around the world to protect freshwater ecosystems, to which it dedicated about $7 million in 2018.
MACP’s Marine Funding in Indonesia and Beyond
Marine planning helps communities create ocean use strategies that are ecologically, culturally and economically sound. These plans divide an area of ocean into different zones for different activities. Some zones can return to a natural state (these are the marine protected areas, or MPAs), while others are used for fishing or tourism.
More than 60 countries, including the U.S., engage in marine planning around the world. The United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals called for protection of 10% of the oceans by 2020, but only about 4.8% is protected at this time, according to the MPAtlas.
MACP carries out a lot of its coastal ecosystem work through MPA development and sustainable fishing programs in Indonesia. This nation of 18,000 islands sits at the center of multiple intercontinental maritime trade routes. It also has one of the highest levels of marine biodiversity on Earth and is the second-largest fish producer after China. Like many coastal communities, its economy and ecosystems are threatened by overfishing, climate change, pollution and other issues.
MACP backs groups that help communities in Indonesia manage local waters and the blue economy. Its funding has focused on establishing networks of MPAs in the particularly biodiverse Sunda and Banda seas. For example, MACP supports the World Wildlife Fund’s efforts to support community-managed MPAs and sustainable fisheries, Brian McNitt, coastal ecosystems program officer says. “WWF’s is establishing an Ecosystem Approach Fisheries Management Learning Center [and helping several communities] strengthen their rights and access to resources.”
As we’ve reported, community involvement in marine planning has been crucial to its success, and MACP is a proponent of this strategy. In its 2017 annual report, Jason Cole, environment program officer, said, “We believe conservation efforts are best achieved in partnership with local communities. They have traditional knowledge and have long served as stewards of these ecosystems, so we focus on how to support their ability to define and manage the resources they depend on.” Along with major international nonprofits, MACP also funds local groups in Indonesia, such as the Coral Triangle Center and its Center for Marine Conservation in Bali.
Outside of Indonesia, MACP also backs community-based conservation in Micronesia, Peru, Chile and East Africa. Another locally rooted organization it funds is the Micronesia Conservation Trust (MCT), which provides technical assistance and subgrants to more than 20 smaller organizations for MPA and fishery management, conservation financing and other projects.
MACP supports collaboration, and several of its grantees, including WWF, Conservation International, RARE and TNC, are part of the Alliance for Conservation Evidence and Sustainability (ACES), which MACP has funded in the past. MACP also hosts convenings for its environmental grantees, as well as those within its other funding concentrations. And MACP partners with other marine funders through the Indonesia Marine Funders Collaborative (IMFC), which formed in 2013.
Funders Team up for Marine Conservation in Indonesia
The IMFC’s core partners include MACP, the David and Lucile Packard Foundation, Walton Family Foundation, and USAID-Indonesia. The Meridian Institute serves as the group’s secretariat. The collaborative contains multiple additional members, including Vibrant Oceans of Bloomberg Philanthropies, the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation, Paul G. Allen Philanthropies/Vulcan Philanthropy, and others.
According to Meridian, “Interested donors recognize the importance of Indonesian marine conservation and sustainable fisheries—as well as the potential for inefficient duplication of effort and competition,” and so came together to improve their impact. Given its dispersed geography, Indonesia can be a tricky area in which to coordinate programs, so working together here makes sense.
As of 2018, the core funders had invested close to $55 million and are on track to invest at least $77 million by the end of 2020. Even before this group formed, foundation grantmaking for Indonesia’s precious waters was on the rise. It increased from $12.5 million in 2007 to more than $34 million in 2015. As of 2018, 172 MPAs had been established across the country, protecting about 6.42% of the country's coastal and marine areas.
Like its core member MACP, IMFC supports both INGOs and community-level grantees, including the Indonesia Locally Managed Marine Area Network (ILMMA), Terra Komunika and others. It also convenes meetings for Indonesian marine funders and grantees and coordinates related research.
Molly Mayo, Meridian project director and IMFC secretariat says the collaborative's near-term goals include refining its communications approach in Indonesia, investing in capacity-building to help “develop strong local leadership in the marine sector,” and “finding an effective [policy approach]” in relation to a new presidential administration. She also says, “The IMFC is hiring an Indonesia-based secretariat to strengthen their presence in the country and planning a potential joint site visit for the spring of this year.”
