Who’s Backing a Bold New Effort to Fight Global Malnutrition?

Three million children die annually from malnutrition, full stop. A healthy diet is out of reach for around 3 billion people. Yet only 1% of development assistance goes that way, despite climate factors and a global pandemic that’s doubled the trouble.

Clearly, the same old solutions aren’t working.

In December, Stronger Foundations for Nutrition moved to create a new community of private funders that’s focused on financing the nutrition agenda. The thinking is that by working together, a broader base can achieve outcomes that can’t be reached alone.

By year’s end, Stronger Foundations had built a coalition that collectively represents $1 billion in commitments pledged in 2021, and plans to build on that. Members seek to reimagine how funds are raised and spent around the globe—acting in concert when it makes sense to align portfolios and share like-minded investment opportunities. Stronger Foundations also aims to help constituencies speak with one voice, build cross-sector and regional relationships, and back innovative ways to address their goals.

Here are four things to know about the coalition’s evolution, and how the funders who’re engaged in its bold and fast scale-up are hunting for better outcomes across food, health and social protection systems.

1. Original seven

The coalition’s original seven members first met on the margins of the 2017 Global Nutrition Summit, when Nutrition for Growth kicked off work on the U.N. Decade of Action on Nutrition by mobilizing new and measurable movement toward goals.

The seven funders included the Aliko Dangote Foundation (ADF)—the private charitable foundation of Nigerian business magnate Alhaji Aliko Dangote. Founded in 1994, ADF is now the largest private foundation in sub-Saharan Africa, and claims the largest endowment created by a single African donor.

The Children’s Investment Fund Foundation, or CIFF, one of the largest foundations in the United Kingdom and the world’s largest philanthropy solely focused on children, was engaged by virtue of an ongoing commitment from 2013.

India’s oldest philanthropic organization, Tata Trusts, and Chaudhary Foundation, the social initiative vehicle of Chaudhary Group, were also in from the beginning. They were joined by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and King Philanthropies, which focuses its grantmaking in countries with high degrees of extreme poverty.

Rounding out the group were two more family foundations, the Eleanor Crook Foundation, a global leader in fighting malnutrition, and the Switzerland-based Family Larsson-Rosenquist Foundation, known for its commitment to global health.

2. Diverse tactics

By the time of the event, the coalition had drawn a number of new partners. Rotary International, which has long and deep experience in public health via its work to eradicate polio, committed $2.5 million as part of its holistic approach to supporting nutritional outcomes in Ethiopia. The Rockefeller Foundation used the opportunity to announce the creation of more robust metrics to track dietary quality to help align funders around a common vision.

GiveWell, which channels large-scale, private giving to high-impact, cost-effective global health and development programs, committed to spending $28 million on community-based management of acute malnutrition. And the Dutch multinational financial services company, Rabobank, engaged in measuring the dietary diversity in small agroforestry carbon projects brought to market on the Acron carbon marketplace.

Earlier commitments include those made as part of Nutrition for Growth Year of Action, like the $50 million CIFF invested alongside UNICEF and the U.K. Foreign Commonwealth and Development Office to form a fund focused on the prevention, detection and treatment of child wasting, a low body weight condition that impacts an estimated 45 million children each year.

3. Four continents

Besides representing a wide range of funders, the coalition also spans four continents. King, Rotary, the Eleanor Crook Foundation and Gates all hail from North America. Europe is represented by CIFF in the U.K., while Larrson-Rosenquist calls Switzerland home. Nigeria’s Dangote Foundation works in Africa, and Asia is represented in Nepal by Chaudhary Foundation and in India by Tata Trusts.

4. Collective action

Matt Freeman, executive director of Stronger Foundations for Nutrition is excited by the premise of bringing leading global philanthropies together to spur learning and collective action, and inspire others to invest in a world free of malnutrition.

Freeman has seen the community of philanthropic funders for nutrition grow from just two at the 2013 Nutrition for Growth Summit to more than a dozen that have collectively pledged more than $3.4 billion to the cause, alongside governments, civil society and the private sector.

Freeman is holding the door open to more. “This diverse and growing network works across the full spectrum of good health and food around the world, and we invite all interested philanthropies to join our community of impact in building stronger foundations for nutrition, and for the future,” he said.

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