Wellington not-for-profits receive almost $1M funding boost in tough economic times.
Nikau Foundation (Te Upoko-o-te-Ika-a-Māui, the Greater Wellington region’s community foundation) has delivered almost $1,000,000 in funding to support not-for-profits facing tough economic times.
A total of $964,744 has been given to fund 168 applications from organisations working in a range of areas, including food insecurity, health and wellbeing and youth, across the Greater Wellington region. This comes at a time when the not-for-profit sector is experiencing significant challenges.
“It is a hard time to be working or volunteering in the not-for-profit sector,” says Nikau Foundation Executive Director, Emma Lewis. “Not only are we operating in uncertain economic conditions, but funding capabilities have generally decreased across the sector.”
This year, the Foundation experienced a significant demand for funding, receiving over 420 applications. This represented a 15% increase from 2023 and a 29% increase from the year before. Of those, over 60% were requesting funding to support the basics – operational overheads and salaries. “These are the costs that are so fundamental to running a not-for-profit, but quite often they are the hardest to secure,” says Emma.
This year, the Foundation has committed almost $600,000 to support these costs.
A tough funding climate
“As a funder, it is important that we lean in when our communities are struggling and work alongside them to offer funding that is helpful, practical and responsive to their needs,” says Emma.
“Securing funding to support salaries is a real win for us and for young people,” says Upper Hutt Community Youth Trust Director of Youth Services, Paul Thompson. “It means our youth workers can continue to work in their areas of strength and make the most impact for our rangatahi.”
In response to challenging economic conditions, over $100,000 of this funding was dedicated to organisations working to alleviate food insecurity through food banks, food rescue and food systems initiatives. This included grants given to the Kāpiti Community Foodbank, Everybody Eats Charitable Trust and food rescue initiatives, Kaibosh and Waiwaste.
The highest amount of funding was given to organisations working in the areas of health and wellbeing ($150,314), youth ($114,779) and food insecurity ($106,380) in line with the demand for funding and high community need in these areas. These include grants given to Upper Hutt Community Youth Trust, to support its transformative youth programme, Mana Wāhine Inc, to support its Te Mauri Cancer Support programme, and Kaicycle, to support its Wellington-based urban composting programme.
“Our people are central to delivering our mission,” says Kaicycle Incorporated Treasurer, Carol Bourn. “Securing funding so we can pay our team the living wage helps us to reduce food insecurity for our communities.”
“There are so many wonderful organisations working to support and uplift our communities,” says Emma. “To be able to support such a wide range of these organisations during our grants round is our pleasure.”
The importance of building the funding base
This year, Nikau Foundation received funding requests totaling over $4,000,000. Of this, the Foundation funded $964,744 (an increase of 5% from last year’s Grants Round).
“Although our funding has increased this year, there is still an incredibly large demand for support in our communities and many wonderful organisations that we were unable to fund this year,” says Emma.
“It really highlights the role that generosity plays and the importance of growing the funding pie to support the future resilience of our communities.”
The Foundation, which actively fundraises, invests and grows all donations, does just that, says Emma. “Community foundations, like Nikau, play a crucial part not only in delivering funding to our communities today but also building reliable funding streams to support our communities long into the future.”
