Howard G. Buffett Foundation
/OVERVIEW: The Howard G. Buffett Foundation awards hundreds of millions in grants annually to organizations that address food security and conflict mitigation globally, along with human trafficking and public safety in the U.S., with the public safety program operating in Illinois, Nebraska, Arizona and Texas. The foundation also runs a smaller program in support of cheetah and mountain gorilla conservation.
IP TAKE: In a recent interview with IP founder David Callahan, Buffett noted that his foundation focuses on food security and agriculture in Rwanda because after “two decades of learning and funding” across Africa, “we picked a place where we can get this done.” And in the Howard G. Buffett Foundation’s recent annual report, Buffett wrote, “the freedom to fail is a great motivator when we want to work where many people or foundations will not work.” Buffett supports and collaborates with stakeholders and grantees that tend to be large NGOs, nonprofits and government agencies; however, the foundation also bankrolls new initiatives that bring a fresh perspective to some of the world’s most persistent problems and volatile situations.
Unfortunately, this is not an approachable foundation. It does not accept or respond to proposals, and it takes a proactive approach to the areas and organizations it funds. Reach out via the contact page with general questions, but a direct connection to Buffett and a deep track record within the foundation’s interest areas is likely the only way to explore funding opportunities.
PROFILE: Based in Decatur, Illinois, the Howard G. Buffett Foundation was established in 1999 by Howard G. Buffett, the son of billionaire investor Warren Buffett. Howard Buffett serves on the board of Berkshire Hathaway and has held several board and executive positions at Fortune 500 companies. According to the biography on his foundation’s site, Buffett is also “a farmer, photographer, businessman, sworn law enforcement officer, former elected official and Chairman and CEO of the Howard G. Buffett Foundation.” The foundation’s mission is “to catalyze transformational change to improve the standard of living and quality of life for the world’s most impoverished and marginalized populations.”
The Buffett Foundation names four main focus areas: food security, conflict mitigation, combating human trafficking and public safety. It also makes “smaller investments in cheetah and mountain gorilla conservation, where we have historical knowledge and relationships.”
Its geographic priorities include Colombia, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Mexico, Rwanda, Ukraine and the United States, but the foundation has previously funded projects all over the world, including South America, the U.K., Eastern Europe, Southeast Asia and many African Countries.
The Buffett Foundation stipulates that it does not provide general operating support to its grantees and expects to spend down its assets by the end of 2045.
Grants for Food Systems and Sustainable Agriculture
The Howard G. Buffett’s food security focus area is its largest, accounting for approximately half of its grantmaking. Giving takes a conservation-based approach to farming practices and focuses on resource development for smallholder farmers in the least developed countries. In 2015, Buffett integrated water security work into its its food security giving, and more recently, the foundation has articulated a commitment to supporting food security in “regions prone to conflict and areas with highly vulnerable populations and limited functioning governments.” As a result, the foundation’s work for food security often overlaps with its conflict mitigation work.
Buffett’s food security grantmaking has responded to the war in Ukraine and its repercussions for grain distribution around the world. The Foundation made a grant of $22.6 million to the Black Sea Grain Initiative for the purchase and distribution of grain to communities experiencing severe hunger in Ethiopia and Yemen. Support has also gone to farming and food distribution efforts within Ukraine, with grants to the World Central Kitchen, the Global Empowerment Mission. The foundation also supported a partnership with Ukrainian First Lady Elena Zelensky to provide school lunches for children in affected regions.
In Central America and Mexico, the Foundation’s food grantmaking has focused on sustainable agricultural practices, with grants supporting organizations including the Water Smart Agriculture Initiative and Alianza Cacao II.
In Rwanda, the Foundation has focused on supporting smallholder farmers through training, leadership development and sustainable irrigation. Grantees include the Rwanda Institute for Conservation Agriculture and the One Acre Fund. The foundation also collaborated with the University of Nebraska-Lincoln and the Rwanda Ministry of Agriculture to create the College of Agriculture and Natural Resource’s Undergraduate Scholars Program.
Grants for Work and Opportunity
A portion of Buffett’s food systems grantmaking has supported Cierto Global, an international labor recruitment operation, for its pilot program to “provide more legal pathways for Guatemalan farmworkers to access H-2A visas.” The initiative aims to address the “high demand for labor in the U.S.” while simultaneously “reducing the number of migrants who take the dangerous risks of crossing the border illegally.”
Grants for Global Development and Security
The Howard G. Buffett Foundation’s conflict mitigation focus area focuses on global conflict as a “barrier to achieving global food security and economic prosperity.” The Foundation’s approach is two-pronged and involves “working to end or improve the conditions that fuel violence” as well as “supporting communities that have been affected by violence or conflict.” Specific strategies include, but are not limited to, economic development, government intervention and “citizen security.”
The foundation has been a major leader in the philanthropic response to the war in Ukraine, as IP has reported. Since the conflict began in 2022, the Howard G. Buffett Foundation has deployed and committed more than $500 million to the Ukrainian cause. IP reporter Liz Longley wrote that “Buffett’s funding in the country is unique in its depth and breadth.”
The Foundation has also supported “post-conflict economic development in Colombia” via the Colombian National Coffee Federation, Mercy Corps and the United Nation’s World Food Program.
In El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras, the foundation has supported multiple initiatives to prevent gang violence and engage youth in community, career and personal development programs. Grantees include Glasswing International and Labor Mobility Partnerships, an organization that aims to “create better job opportunities for half a billion workers from low-income countries by 2050.”
Buffett has supported the prevention of atrocities in the Democratic Republic of Congo via grants to the Kivu Security Tracker, which collects and analyzes data on “patterns, trends, causes of insecurity and serious violations of international human rights and humanitarian law.”
The Foundation has also provided support to the School of Leadership Afghanistan, which used funding to relocate female student refugees and support their continued learning at schools in Rwanda, Canada and the U.S.
Grants for Violence Prevention and Human Rights
The Buffett Foundation’s giving areas for Public Safety and Human Trafficking focus on interventions and programs in the U.S. Launched in 2021, Human Trafficking is the foundation’s newest giving area. Grantmaking aims to provide support to “the efforts of law enforcement, prosecutors and victim service providers in targeted communities to disrupt human traffickers, dismantle their networks and bring justice to victims of human trafficking.” An early area of focus is “forced labor in agriculture.”
In Georgia, the Foundation has supported the Georgia Bureau of Investigations, Georgia Legal Services and the victims services group Tapestri. The efforts of these organizations led to the indictment of “24 defendants for operating a $200 million human trafficking and money laundering scheme.”
The Foundation has partnered with the Sherwood Foundation and Survivor Alliance to pilot a Survivor Leadership Academy, which provides 18-month training sessions to human trafficking survivors so that they can, in turn, “engage, mentor and empower” other survivors.
Other grantees of this program include the Western District of New York Human Trafficking Task Force, Wisconsin’s United Migrant Opportunity Services, AEquitas and the International Rescue Committee Miami.
Buffett’s Public Safety grantmaking focuses on the geographic locations where the foundation operates: Illinois, Nebraska, Arizona and Texas. This is a smaller area of giving, accounting for about ten percent of the foundation’s grantmaking overall. Public safety giving focuses on the public safety concerns of communities, police training and professional development and “volunteer fire departments in rural communities where resources are scarce.”
In Macon County, Illinois, the Foundation provided funding to the Sheriff’s Office for the purchase of vehicles, the development of K9 units and “significant upgrades to the jail, including doubling the medical care available to inmates.” In Decatur, Illinois, the foundation gave $60 million for the establishment of a Community Care Campus for substance abuse treatment. Grants have also gone to tthe Decatur Police Department, the Cochise County Sheriff’s Office and the Macon County Fire Departments, among others.
Grants for Animals and Wildlife
While wildlife is no longer a main focus area for this funder, Buffett has provided ongoing support to organizations involved in cheetah and mountain gorilla conservation, which are past areas of focus. Grantees include the Nature Conservation Trust, the Wildlife Conservation Network and the Cheetah Conservation Fund.
Important Grant Details:
This funder’s grants range from $5,000 to the tens of millions, so funding can range widely.
Most larger grants represent ongoing collaborations and commitments.
This is a hands-on funder. Buffett often works with its grantees in the planning and execution of specific goals.
Of the foundation’s four main giving areas, Food Security and Conflict Mitigation are global in scope, while Human Trafficking and Public safety are mainly limited to to the U.S.
Buffett does not typically award grants for general operating support, preferring to fund specific projects and initiatives.
The Foundation does not accept and will not respond to unsolicited proposals for funding; it appears to conduct is own research to select grantees.
Use the Buffett Foundation’s contact page to submit general inquiries.
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