The FLAC’s New York Climate Week

Climate Week took place in New York City from 17 to 24 of September. In recent years, it has become an opportunity for funders, corporates, entrepreneurs, policy-makers, activists, and civil society organizations to convene and generate pledges, protests, cocktail evenings, and strategic movement-building spaces. NYC Climate Week is evidence of the different approaches to the climate crisis.

Members of the FLAC’s Coordination Team, María Alejandra, Ursula, Kika, and Zoé met in New York City for Climate week.

For us, NYC Climate Week meant an opportunity to meet with FLAC members and other key climate funders. María Alejandra, Ursula, Kika, and Zoé attended and convened several meetings. One highlight was their meeting with Juli (FJS), Hilary (CJRF), and Margarita (FIMI), in which they shared visions and strategies. We thank the three of them for making the time to connect.

Coordination Team members met with the CLUA team to start exploring synergies and collaborations in connection to CLUA’s strategic framework, currently in development. Laura García and Anisha Chugh, Executive Directors of Global Greengrants Fund and Women’s Fund Asia respectively, joined Kika, María Alejandra, Ursula and Zóe for a meeting with representatives of the Ban Ki-Moon Foundation, the JPB Foundation, the Ocean Foundation, and Nia Taro. The meet-up allowed the FLAC envoys the chance to better understand where these mainly U.S.-based climate foundations are in terms of gender justice and what challenges they’re facing. One of the challenges we heard is a familiar one: How to keep funding radical climate partners when and if their work is still heavily patriarchal? The FLAC team also had the opportunity to share more about the work that we do and the FLAC’s aspiration to create a different model for philanthropy. Generally speaking the space allowed them to practice speaking about the FLAC to a new audience.

We encourage all FLAC members attending other philanthropic advocacy spaces to collectively map out spaces where we can meet informally as a community. For example, the EDGE Conference will be held in Berlin from 18 to 20 of October, and COP 28 is happening in Dubai from November 30 to December 12. Is anyone planning to attend? Feel free to let us know via email or WhatsApp!