The Oak Foundation was established in 1983 to address global, social and environmental concerns. The Oak Foundation has a principal office in Switzerland and other offices in Denmark, India, the United Kingdom and the United States. Through its grantmaking, the Oak Foundation supports others to make the world a safer, fairer, and more sustainable place to live. The Oak Foundation supports civil society as a pillar of democracy and justice and nurtures innovation and visionary leadership.
Development Co-operation Profiles
Report
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Oak Foundation
Introduction
Private development finance
The Oak Foundation provided USD 250 million for development in 2022 through its grant-making activities. Compared to 2021, this amount represents an increase of 61.7% in real terms.
Support to Ukraine
In 2022, the Oak Foundation provided USD 21.7 million of gross development finance to Ukraine to respond to the impacts of Russia’s war of aggression. Moreover, USD 2.2 million was granted in support of Ukrainian refugees and asylum seekers in neighbouring countries.
Bilateral and multilateral allocations
In 2022, the Oak Foundation channelled its development finance mostly through non-governmental organisations (NGOs) and civil society (USD 226.2 million), public-private partnerships (PPPs), networks and the private sector (USD 19.3 million) and universities, research institutes or think tanks (USD 3.4 million).
Multilateral channels
In 2022, the Oak Foundation provided USD 500 thousand to the multilateral system, representing 0.2% of its development finance, notably to UNICEF.
Civil society organisations
In 2022, civil society organisations (CSOs) received USD 226.2 million of the Oak Foundation’s gross development finance. Of this, 42.5% was allocated to CSOs as core support, while the remainder of 57.5% was earmarked for specific projects or programmes. NGOs based in developing countries channelled 17.2% of these contributions, whereas international NGOs nearly half (49.9%).
Learn more about the DAC Recommendation on Enabling Civil Society in Development Co-operation and Humanitarian Aid.
Geographic and thematic focus
In 2022, the Oak Foundation’s development finance was primarily focused on Latin America and the Caribbean and Asia (excluding the Middle East). USD 45.2 million was allocated to Latin America and the Caribbean and USD 29.4 million to Asia (excluding the Middle East), accounting respectively for 18.1% and 11.7% of gross development finance. A sum of USD 129.3 million (51.7%) was unspecified by region in 2022, mainly including multi-regional programmes, core support and research grants. In this context, USD 8.3 million was provided in support of refugees and asylum-seekers in donor countries.
Figure. Bilateral private development finance by recipient country
In 2022, 36.8% of gross development finance went to the top 10 recipients, most notably Brazil, Ukraine, India, Zimbabwe and Mexico.
Least developed countries (LDCs) and other low-income countries (LICs) received USD 4.8 million (1.9%) of the Oak Foundation’s gross disbursements in 2022. The Oak Foundation allocated the largest share (20.1%) of its development finance to upper middle-income countries in 2022, followed by lower middle-income countries (16.7%), noting that USD 153.1 million (61.2%) was unallocated by income group.
Notes: LDC: least developed country; LIC: low-income country; LMIC: lower middle-income country; UMIC: upper middle-income country; MADCTs: more advanced developing countries and territories.
Furthermore, the Oak Foundation allocated USD 9.5 million of its development finance to land-locked developing countries in 2022.
Fragile contexts
Support to fragile contexts reached USD 15 million in 2022, representing 6% of the Oak Foundation’s development finance.
Notes: HDP: humanitarian-development-peace. The chart represents only gross bilateral contributions that are allocated by country.
Sectors
In 2022, 45.5% of the Oak Foundation’s contributions were allocated to social infrastructure and services, 13.7% to economic infrastructure and services and 20.7% to multi-sector and cross-cutting issues such as general environmental protection. In terms of sectors, the Oak Foundation’s largest allocations went to support for government and civil society (USD 89.9 million), general environmental protection (USD 50.9 million), energy (USD 31.6 million), agriculture, forestry and fishing (USD 15.8 million) and education (USD 10.6 million). Humanitarian assistance amounted to USD 12.5 million.
Sustainable Development Goals
In 2022, Oak Foundation committed the largest shares of its contributions to partnerships for the goals (SDG 17), reduced inequalities (SDG 10) and peace, justice and strong institutions (SDG 16) of the United Nations 2030 Agenda. Support for gender equality and women’s empowerment amounted to USD 90.9 million. Contributions to combatting climate change totalled USD 78.4 million.
Additional resources
Official website: https://oakfnd.org
The methodological notes provide further details on the definitions and statistical methodologies applied, including core and earmarked contributions to multilateral organisations, the Sustainable Development Goal focus of private development finance, channels of delivery, unspecified/unallocated allocations, the gender equality policy marker, and the environment markers.