This year has brought with it unique and unprecedented challenges.
Animal Charity Evaluators (ACE) has grappled with the financial, strategic, and psychological repercussions of COVID-19 and the emotional toll of the tragic events that necessitated the Black Lives Matter uprising (with which we show total solidarity). We are grateful that our team has become even more cohesive and coordinated as we continue to navigate these trying circumstances.
Some donors have contacted ACE seeking guidance about giving during these significant world events. Fortunately, as our Top and Standout Charities were evaluated and recommended in part for their ability to learn and adapt, we are confident that they still offer exceptionally effective giving opportunities. Changing giving plans too strongly based on current events could be harmful for the movement, both in the short and long terms, as charities rely on stable revenue to navigate unexpected challenges like the ones we’ve experienced in 2020.
This blog conveys how our recommended charities have adapted to COVID-19 in particular. The charities share how they’ve adjusted their strategies, programs, staffing plans, and fundraising goals in response to the changing social and political contexts in which they operate. Our hope is that this information will help donors better understand how these effective organizations are creatively and flexibly finding opportunities amidst the obstacles. Donors should remain confident that their financial support of ACE’s Top and Standout Charities will continue to have a positive impact for animals.
Top Charities interviewed include Albert Schweitzer Foundation (ASF), Anima International, The Good Food Institute (GFI), and The Humane League (THL). Standout Charities interviewed include Compassion in World Farming USA (Compassion USA), Faunalytics, the Federation of Indian Animal Protection Organisations (FIAPO), Sinergia Animal, and Sociedade Vegetariana Brasileira (SVB). Note that not all charities provided information for every question.
Please note that ACE lightly edited charities’ responses for clarity.
What strategic changes have you made as a result of the direct/indirect impacts of COVID-19?
Albert Schweitzer Foundation
In light of COVID-19, we have paused all pressure campaigns and offline consumer outreach activities. Our corporate outreach team re-focused their efforts on businesses that were not negatively impacted by the lockdown measures, such as retailers and delivery services. Regarding our messaging, we have published two articles on the connection between humankind’s hunger for animal products and pandemics. The first of these articles was accompanied by a press release demanding that stakeholders in politics, science, and business consider factory farming as a risk factor for future pandemics and the promotion of plant-based alternatives as a solution. We received a few follow-up questions and interview requests from the media, which were answered by one of the members of our scientific advisory board (who also authored the article).
Anima International
We work across 10 countries, all of which have been affected by the pandemic in different ways. Many of our campaigns have been only minimally affected, but the biggest strategy change was necessary within our corporate campaigns. During the first few weeks of some countries being in lockdown, some of our teams made the decision to pause their corporate campaigns or switch to positive-style campaigns instead, such as publicly praising companies that had already made animal-friendly commitments.
In Poland, we took this time to publish the first ever supermarket chain ranking report, celebrating the progress companies are making and highlighting those that still have a lot to do. Our global cage-free campaigns team paused all new communication with global companies, instead sending those we were already working with notes of support and reassurance that we understand this will be a difficult period for them. At the same time, we kept up the work on getting translations for the global commitment from Metro, securing Turkish and Japanese translations of the global policy (thus holding Turkey and Japan accountable to the policy as well) during lockdown.
The Good Food Institute
We have been a remote organization since our founding, but much of our external work is done face-to-face. As so many of our partners and industry stakeholders are working in similar home setups, we have used our remote work experience to pivot our engagement tactics and meet people where they are.
In April, we published a blog highlighting GFI resources that support good food entrepreneurs, scientists, and students. The blog post outlines industry job listings, funding resources for researchers, and a free massive open online course. We’re now hosting two webinars per month focused on scientists and entrepreneurs, one per month for cultivated meat companies, and others focused on the plant-based and cultivated meat industries more generally (e.g., we hosted 300+ people for each of our State of the Industry Report webinars). We also held webinars in Israel, Brazil, Asia-Pacific, and India. GFI-India launched a weekly GFIdeas-India webinar series which includes a special focus on the new challenges the country is facing as a result of the pandemic. We also hosted a webinar on cultivated meat safety oversight for the food safety NGO community and food scientists, and we co-hosted—with the Merck Group—a webinar for scientists that was attended by almost 1,200 people.
The Humane League
In the U.S., we have been working to end the abuse of more than 8 billion chickens raised for meat by pressuring companies to sign onto the Better Chicken Commitment (BCC). While this campaign continues, THL is temporarily shifting our focus away from restaurants and toward producers, such as Tyson. This shift aims to pressure major chicken producers to adopt higher welfare standards for chickens raised for meat and stands in solidarity with slaughterhouse workers demanding basic workplace protections. With daily breaking news about the meat industry’s abuse of workers, the culling of millions of animals, and the risks to public health, producers are uniquely vulnerable to pressure right now. This new initiative adapts our campaigns to the challenges and opportunities of the present moment, while still making meaningful progress toward making the BCC the new standard for chickens raised for meat. Using our tried-and-true digital campaign tactics, we are putting pressure on producers to reform their supply chains, but we will return to campaigning for the BCC with restaurants and supermarkets when the context is more appropriate.
Compassion in World Farming USA
We operated under a remote model ahead of COVID-19, so we’re well-positioned to function efficiently outside of an office-based culture. However, we heavily relied on travel to attend food company meetings, conferences, and events, and to film for educational and campaign videos. We hosted our first virtual food business-focused webinar on chicken welfare in May, going through the science behind the Better Chicken Commitment and the business and market case for making the transition. We had an excellent turnout, with over 50 attendees from leading food companies across the food sectors, including a top-five chicken producer that has never engaged previously on the subject. Not only did we find this an interesting and versatile way to continue engagement, but we also found that it was a low-barrier form of engaging with new companies that have not historically engaged with animal protection NGOs. We also recorded virtual interviews for the purpose of creating a news video to be released in late June.
While incremental welfare reform remains a central focus, we are also building a call for broader systemic change into our strategy, linking animal welfare, food system resilience, environmentalism, and public health. An essential part of this strategy includes presenting solutions and focusing on reducing the number of intensively-farmed animals in the food system.
Faunalytics
We are fortunate that we are a completely remote organization and our day-to-day operations have not been impacted by the economic shutdown. Our Executive Director conducted an analysis of the state of the nonprofit sector, charitable giving after the 2008/2009 recession, and our current financial state, including our budget vs. actuals vs. projected changes. The Board of Directors reviewed the analysis, and we made small revisions to the budget. The Executive Director and Board Treasurer drafted a contingency plan in the event that our income and assets fall significantly. Due to our fundraising cycle, we receive most donations in Q1 and Q4, so we likely won’t know the full impact of COVID-19 on our fundraising until January 2021.
Federation of Indian Animal Protection Organisations
Our ability to take on fieldwork was significantly reduced, so we moved to digital platforms to keep our engagement with our stakeholders (activists and bureaucrats) alive. We have been writing to government bodies to regulate intensive confinement in animal agriculture and shut down live animal meat markets, combining efforts with other animal protection organizations in the country, wherever possible. Our strategy has been to position all of our campaigns around the interconnectedness of public health, the environment, and animal health. Our communication is framed to emphasize a solution-based approach and offer a message of hope through the implementation of existing legal and policy frameworks that protect both public health and animals. We wrote to a development bank (NABARD) to curb its new scheme to provide subsidies and low-interest loans to open dairy farms.
We also launched our Living Free app to help people automatically file complaints with authorities about the illegal slaughter of animals, as illegal backyard slaughter surged during this time. We wrote to bureaucrats and organized strategy meetings with the country’s animal protection leaders to develop standard operating procedures, which required liaising at multiple levels from the government to volunteers. The standard operating procedures would ensure animals on the street and on farms (ranging from dogs to elephants) wouldn’t die of starvation, as animals on the streets depend upon waste from restaurants or roadside shops, which were closed during the lockdown. We made a strategic shift to raise money for organizations feeding these animals and partnered with organizations supporting stranded migrant workers to help with the feeding.
Sinergia Animal
We have increased online actions and digital ads for our corporate cage-free egg campaigns to compensate for the fact that street actions had to be paused. Corporate outreach also continues, and we have been able to secure some commitments during the crisis. We held many video conferences and have adopted a more friendly tone in our messaging. We anticipate, however, that the current scenario is likely to reduce the number of policies we would otherwise have been able to secure. Our campaigns are less hard-hitting, as one of our main tools is to carry visual interventions on the streets to get media coverage. We are also avoiding sending new campaign notices to companies, considering the mental and social challenges many of us are facing.
As for our institutional meat reduction campaign in Colombia, this year we’ve secured commitments from nine institutions. We also expect to see fewer new commitments being secured than planned, as this usually requires building trust via in-person meetings. Fortunately, our online vegan challenges have not been affected. We have released two investigations since February and expect to release four more that we had concluded before the pandemic. Otherwise, fieldwork is on hold. Finally, we have used science-based information on social media, highlighting the links between zoonosis and animal agriculture.
Sociedade Vegetariana Brasileira
We started using a distance-learning platform that enabled (i) the creation of free public webinars on topics related to our work; and (ii) the creation of an introductory class on plant-based nutrition for health professionals and dietitians for the symbolic cost of $5 (USD) per person. We averaged 315 participants in the first two editions. We intend to make one edition per month, as well as other specialized classes to deepen people’s knowledge on specific topics and bring continuity to the introductory class on plant-based nutrition.
We also boosted SVB’s YouTube channel by hiring a vegan chef who teaches vegan recipes once a week, resulting in an increase of 2,800 channel subscriptions, and we carried out one-hour “lives” on the Meatless Mondays Instagram (@segundasemcarne) for over 44 days, five days a week, with different guests talking about the benefits of plant-based eating. Additionally, we initiated a challenge toward non-vegan influencers to eat vegan at least one day of the week.
We have made changes in our internal communication as well, creating monthly internal newsletters and webinars to share the progress of each department and cover topics such as mental health. Unfortunately, our e-commerce platform was suspended for two months due to difficulties related to the pandemic since the staff is responsible for shipping the products and everyone was kept at home.
What programmatic changes have you made as a result of the direct/indirect impacts of COVID-19?
- Have you incorporated pandemic-related messaging into your outreach to the media, public, legislators, companies, or other stakeholders?
- If so, what were the messages? How did they resonate/what was the result?
Albert Schweitzer Foundation
We are now highlighting pandemic risks as well as the risk of the development of antibiotic resistance in our corporate outreach. This messaging will play an even bigger role once we launch our meat reduction work.
Anima International
Some of our organizations (U.K., Poland, Estonia, Denmark, and Ukraine) began a campaign to end live animal markets. Each country had a slightly different message tailored to what we thought would be the most effective locally, but all focused on the ending of live animal markets. The campaign was supported by investigation footage and images we took in Thailand last year before the pandemic began. The campaigns were well-received by our supporters, although basing results on the number of petition signatures we received, the results were not greater than our usual farmed animal campaigns. The results varied by country: Estonia reported much more engagement than Poland when compared to other campaigns.
The Good Food Institute
In light of the public safety concerns, we made the difficult decision to cancel our 2020 Good Food Conference. Other than pausing similar in-person events and travel, we are unlikely to either suspend or launch any other programs in response to COVID-19, but we are monitoring the situation and staying nimble. GFI sent an email to both our e-newsletter subscribers and annual fund donors with our official COVID-19 message of solidarity. Since then, we have expanded upon this message across our owned and earned channels to illustrate how alternative proteins can help address the urgent public health issues and supply chain vulnerabilities.
Given the economic impacts the pandemic will likely have on the alternative protein community, we’ve provided resources and hosted an online panel discussion to help startups adapt to the changes. We have also highlighted how public funding support for relevant research and development could yield positive economic benefits. Additionally, we have focused much of our public-facing campaigns and media outreach on how alternative proteins can help mitigate the disease risks (USA Today) associated with conventional animal agriculture while strengthening the protein supply chain (Wired). On top of additional media coverage (on Wired, Politico, and Morning Brew), we’ve received an uptick in requests for comments on the pandemic from major U.S. news outlets. Our stability and commitment to our mission and theory of change during these uncertain times has led to engaging conversations with GFI’s stakeholders and affirmed their support of us as an effective and impactful nonprofit.
The Humane League
Amidst this rapidly changing global landscape, THL has been focused on providing our supporters with resources for at-home animal advocacy, remote working tips, and uplifting and useful content such as plant-based recipes and feel-good videos. In addition, we are educating our supporters and the public about the connection between zoonotic diseases and factory farming. We’ve built a new resource center on our website focused on our broken food system, partnered with organizations advocating for the health and safety of workers in meat processing plants due to COVID-19, and launched our first ever producer campaign against Tyson Foods—putting pressure on them to move toward adopting the Better Chicken Commitment and prioritizing plant-based products. In support of this messaging and these initiatives, we’ve published several opinion pieces in outlets including NY Daily News, Common Dreams, Salon, and others.
THL has focused on educating our supporters about the connections between zoonotic diseases and animal agriculture, providing resources from experts like staff veterinarians. While we are committed to our strategic principles and our long-term strategy, the way in which we frame our corporate engagement, legislative work, and even plant-based advocacy can be adapted for the times to ensure resonance and impact. In zooming out and focusing on the larger picture—our broken food system—and specifically, zoonotic diseases, we’ve been able to generate public interest and media exposure around our cause area in a way that hasn’t been possible before. In 2020 to date, we’ve earned 122 pieces of media coverage, including the op-eds mentioned above.
Compassion in World Farming USA
We are highlighting the fragility of our food system, demonstrating what a more resilient system looks like, and identifying what we need to do to start building it. We are continuing with our three focal areas: broiler welfare commitments, cage-free and broiler chicken policy implementation, and reducing overall reliance on animal proteins. We recognize that the shape and timing of the work will need to be flexible since many of the companies that we work with have urgent issues to address related to COVID-19. However, we are not planning to deviate substantially from our strategy. Having consistency in our message, asks, and expectations will be critical to maintaining the trust and credibility with the food industry and demonstrating to them that we will continue to hold them accountable to their commitments. We have found, and have heard from consumer insights firms, that consumers are now more interested in product attributes such as animal welfare and sustainability than they were before COVID-19. Therefore, we are reinforcing to companies the criticality of not only continuing to address new (to the business) animal welfare and sustainability issues, but also making good on the commitments they have already made.
We are also devoting time to internally advance our plans and tools to reduce reliance on animal proteins. This includes developing a methodology for measuring the multi-dimensional environmental impacts of animal protein purchasing. This is critical not only because of the connectivity it will draw between animal purchasing and environmental impacts, but also because it will clearly demonstrate that simply switching from beef to chicken and fish—increasing the total number of animals in the system—is not an environmentally-friendly solution. We will also continue to forge cross-sector NGO and other stakeholder relationships that will better enable us to lay out a pathway for systemic change of the food system.
Faunalytics
We (i) conducted a poll that explored the U.S. public’s understanding of COVID-19 and its connection to animals (among other findings, we learned that only 10%–20% of people in the U.S. understand the zoonotic origins of the novel coronavirus), (ii) wrote a blog outlining the myths and facts around COVID-19 and animals, (iii) wrote an article on fundraising in an economic crisis, (iv) compiled a resource page specifically for animal advocates, and (v) published the newest addition to our fundamentals series—Fundamentals: Zoonoses—to support organizations that have begun or bolstered their efforts to eliminate the sale of live animals in wet markets.
Advocates at several organizations reported that the poll has informed their work. One testimonial from an Executive Vice President at a farmed animal advocacy organization shared: “This is fantastic! Thanks for passing it along. It will be very helpful to us since we’re shifting a lot of our efforts now to strategic communications generally, which includes questions around how to address this pandemic.” Faunalytics’ poll, conducted late March, was also a precursor to Rethink Priorities’ report on pandemic messaging. Their report echoed our findings that while “a carefully-presented, factual argument can be convincing […] caution is strongly indicated, because a substantial minority of respondents found the argument misleading […] Moving from education to advocacy increases the risk of reactance (backfire effects).” In the last two months, the aforementioned resources received over 3,400 pageviews.
Federation of Indian Animal Protection Organisations
We reached out to the Food Safety Authority in all of the cities we are active in via our Stop Slaughter Cruelty (SSC) campaign to look at the potential for illegal meat shops to cause zoonotic disease outbreaks. Similar communications were made to authorities regarding captive elephants. As there was a ban on communicating about the pandemic during the initial stage of community spread to avoid misinformation online, our messaging was mainly around guiding people on how to feed animals on the street, countering blatantly false information about COVID-19, and running online cooking contests for our audience (as the time spent on social media and interest in cooking spiked during lockdown). These contests resulted in a six-fold increase in those taking the 21-Day Compassion Challenge. Four of our campaigns (SSC, Elephant Rights, Corporate Engagement, and Human Behaviour Change) were reframed with regard to COVID-19, with an increased focus on how animal agriculture and human behavior are directly and indirectly contributing to the emergence of such diseases.
We introduced a free webinar series called “Learn From Leaders” to build the capacity of our activists who work with us in different campaigns, and modules were developed for SSC, HBC, and Rabies Free India. We also launched a COVID-19 helpline for people struggling with animal-related emergencies during lockdown. Finally, we have intensified our media engagement, placing 10 different news stories that were picked up by multiple outlets, resulting in 61 mentions to support our work, so far.
Sinergia Animal
We have not changed our programs dramatically; we’ve only focused more on online activities and media outreach. In some programs, we incorporated science-based, pandemic-related messaging from trusted sources. Our Indonesian investigation and press release mentioned that the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) considers intensive livestock operations, such as battery-cage farms, to increase the risk of spreading new zoonotic diseases. We highlighted that according to the European Food Safety Authority, the prevalence of salmonella, a zoonotic disease, is higher in caged farms. Our messaging suggested that moving toward a more plant-based diet was a good way to help animals and improve human health. This narrative seemed to be successful and secured 13 media hits. Other press releases we sent about zoonotic diseases and antibiotic resistance earned one media hit in Argentina, six in Chile, and 11 in Thailand. We considered the media reaction to be positive; further, some of the outlets are mainstream.
We joined ProVeg in its open letter to UNEP, inviting them to advocate for plant-based diets to avoid future pandemics. As an experiment, we launched petitions in Argentina, Chile, Brazil, Colombia, Thailand, and Indonesia, asking leaders and legislators to phase out intensive livestock operations and move toward plant-based food systems to help prevent pandemics. We don’t want to be seen as “opportunistic,” so we haven’t started promoting these petitions intensively yet. When the worst has passed, we will promote them more, watch reactions closely, and try to engage with more progressive leaders to see if some of them are interested in working with these topics.
Sociedade Vegetariana Brasileira
We had to postpone our Meatless Mondays Campaign workshops in which we were to train cooks, as the vast majority are low-income and sometimes older women without access to the internet and/or online platforms. We also had to cancel all of our upcoming events: Vegfest Brazil 2020, SVB’s Cooking Show 2020 (at Naturaltech/BioBrazil/BioFach Fair), two trainings for health professionals in the first semester, and another four trainings for health professionals in the second semester (which had not yet been publicized). Several events in which we would have taken part had to be postponed to October or November (Fispal Food Service, Fispal Tecnologia and FiSA (Food Ingredients South America); others were canceled (Arnold Sports Festival South America, Naturaltech/BioBrazil/BioFach Fair). A few other events are still determining whether to postpone for late 2020 or cancel, such as Plant Based Conference Brazil.
Leveraging the sudden worldwide sensitivity to public health and epidemiology issues, we launched a campaign called Ticking Bomb and a short video with celebrities, including former TV show host Xuxa Meneghel—with over 11 million followers—asking people to stop eating animals. We have also used our social media and website to promote a book written by Cynthia Schuck (renowned epidemiologist and SVB’s Scientific Coordinator) called Pandemics, Global Health and Consumer Choices (available in Portuguese). The campaign’s goal is to finally put factory farms in the center of the debate about emerging infectious diseases (both because of virus recombinations and increase of antibiotic resistance). We are searching for sponsors and donors to help us access the mainstream media. The campaign video reached over 430,000 Instagram accounts with over 8,000 redirects to others. These numbers do not include the video posted by celebrities: Xuxa, for example, posted the video and achieved 212,000 views; Luisa Mell achieved 219,000 views.
What staffing changes have you made as a result of the direct/indirect impacts of COVID-19?
- Have you had to lay off any staff, reduce staff wages, adjust working hours, stop working with contractors, halt paid intern programs, modify benefits, or make other such personnel changes? Will you be planning any such changes in the next six months?
Albert Schweitzer Foundation
Since our financial situation is relatively stable, and—with some small adjustments—all staff members still had meaningful work to do, we did not have to furlough or lay anyone off. We even stuck to our plan to slightly increase wages (though levels are still below large German NGOs) and hire for positions for which we had already budgeted. These efforts will allow us to come out of this crisis stronger than when we entered it.
Anima International
We have not had to lay off any staff or reduce wages as a result of the pandemic in any of our countries and do not predict that we will have to do so in the next six months. However, our ability and desire to bring on more staff will likely decrease in the near future. It is wise to be cautious as we are still unsure of the pandemic’s effect on our overall fundraising, and it is likely that the full scale of the impact will take a long time to materialize.
The Good Food Institute
Fortunately, because our budget is based on what we received in donations the prior year, we have not had to take any adverse employment action solely due to COVID-19 in 2020. COVID-19 hit at a time when GFI’s leadership team was taking a step back to prioritize our many objectives and ensure our support function foundation was strong before our next growth spurt. As a result, we curtailed our hiring plan for the year, reducing it from almost 20 new positions to two. This reduction resulted in letting three human resources team members go because we did not have work for them to do. Due to the unique circumstances of COVID-19, we provided each affected team member with a severance package, which is not our standard operating procedure. We will not know whether changes to staffing levels in 2021 will be required until we complete the 2020 fundraising cycle and can assess our 2021 budget, but we are optimistic that there will be no further staffing changes. To show support, we allowed our team members to take off as much paid time as they felt necessary for several months and also had several GFI-wide extra holidays during which team members were encouraged not to send any email and instead to rest.
The Humane League
Due to financial uncertainty, THL instituted a U.S. hiring freeze and put our open positions on hold. There are exceptions to this for two positions that are critical to the organization’s functioning and have a significant impact on bandwidth for the respective teams. This hiring freeze and each paused open position is re-evaluated on a monthly basis. By making conservative financial decisions in the short term, we hope to avoid making more painful decisions down the road. In the U.K., the government offered a furlough scheme for businesses and charities that are struggling through the COVID-19 pandemic and are unable to undertake their normal work. To ensure that THL UK has funds to last us until the end of the year, nine members from the U.K. team were placed on furlough from April 20 to June 30. The government has covered a large portion of their salaries, and THL UK covered the balance.
Compassion in World Farming USA
Compassion USA is fortunate to currently be in a financially stable position and has not had to make any changes to the number of staff, wages, hours, or any other employee-related costs. Some work with contractors was put on hold due to travel restrictions. Because all of our staff already worked remotely, we were well-positioned to transition to stay-at-home recommendations. We’re proud to have a flexible, family-friendly work culture, through which staff were empowered to adjust and prioritize work hours, child care, and mental health. We were able to proceed with plans for hiring roles that we had already budgeted for and which were deemed essential to delivering the organization’s strategy and navigating the situation with COVID-19. It also must be noted that while our income has not immediately suffered, and while we remain optimistic, we are very mindful that the global economy will be significantly impacted, and we do not yet know the mid- and long-term impact of COVID-19 on our fundraising program. Any potential hiring of new roles will be continuously assessed as we more accurately evaluate future financial outlooks and impacts stemming from COVID-19.
Faunalytics
No such changes have been made or are anticipated in the next six months. As mentioned, we will not know COVID-19’s full impact on our fundraising until after December.
Federation of Indian Animal Protection Organisations
We have made changes to the way our work is carried out—implementing a remote working model with all of our staff working from home during the lockdown. The staff has also been offered flexibility in terms of working hours, as some members have to tackle other household chores when working from home. We supported people taking time off during this period as per their individual requirements. We continued our employee engagement activities (albeit remotely), organizing trainings, virtual team meetings, and a wellness session with a trained counselor. We have not laid off any employee who is on the payroll of the organization. There are no internship positions that were open earlier, and hence none were halted. We are not planning to make any staffing changes apart from hiring only for essential positions. The current employees will get the benefits they signed on as per their employment agreement.
Sinergia Animal
Due to the fact that our work is focused on bringing structural change to animals in the mid and long run, we believe we should be respectful and acknowledge that saving human lives, securing stable livelihoods, and alleviating social problems are now top priorities, especially in the countries where we operate. We prioritized taking care of all our collaborators and team members and didn’t do any layoffs, reduce wages or working hours, or cut benefits. On the contrary, we thought it was time to be kind and supportive. We started having more online meetings to socialize and support each other, we held mindfulness meditation meetings, and we are planning to do an online retreat in the coming months to improve our relationships and work relations.
We also invited our team members to participate in many webinars to learn from and get inspired by other organizations’ work. We attended webinars held by ProVeg, the Center for Effective Vegan Advocacy (CEVA), Mighty Earth, Humane Society International (HSI), Mercy For Animals, and Anima International, among others. Some of our contractors who help us with street actions were invited to work for us on online activities so they could still pay their bills and support their families during the pandemic. This was especially important since we work exclusively in countries of the Global South, where economies and personal finances are more fragile. We take our social responsibility and the wellbeing of our team and collaborators very seriously. For the next six months, the only thing we will consider is delaying future hires if our new positions are not so productive during the social distancing period. We are still evaluating that.
Sociedade Vegetariana Brasileira
The first and most important change was the institution of home office for all the staff. SVB also halted payments of transportation aid to the staff due to the new home office regime. Also, staff started to write reports of their daily work. No other operational changes were made. We had a request from a staff member for unpaid leave since the work he performed (related to restaurant visits and the launch of vegan options) would be made virtually impossible at the moment. Other than that, we had no changes whatsoever.
How has COVID-19 affected the political and social context in which you operate?
Albert Schweitzer Foundation
Early in the crisis, animal welfare became less meaningful to politicians, the media, and the general public. We are now seeing this effect reversing step-by-step.
Anima International
Our political work, such as ending the sale and production of foie gras in the Ukraine and banning fur production in Estonia, continued with only minimal disruption during the first few weeks of the pandemic in Europe. Socially, we tweaked our messaging for supporters where needed, mainly to ensure they knew that we supported them but more importantly, that we were continuing our work and pushing forward just as hard as before.
The Good Food Institute
While we know that the political and social contexts in which GFI operates will continue to evolve, we can speak to a few contextual changes to our operating environment. In the U.S., all state legislatures in which we work have been closed and congressional office meetings are now held by phone. However, Congress’ stimulus plans offered GFI an important opportunity to weigh in on where newly available funding could be directed. In April, we quickly developed a response to the House Committee on Science, Space, & Technology’s request for input on “ideas to be included in any future near-term response and longer-term economic stimulus package(s)…to address and mitigate the impacts of the current COVID-19 crisis.” In response, we submitted an official comment requesting $100 million to advance critical research for alternative proteins.
Our focus in 2020 is on staying the course. We have been on an incredible trajectory over the last few years and are as committed to our mission as ever. While we are no doubt experiencing changes to our work, our aim has not shifted. Time that we would have spent on travel and attending conferences is now devoted to reflecting, strategizing, and strengthening our internal systems. We are also very focused on keeping morale up and providing our employees with the support that they need during this time, be it additional mental health resources or even greater flexibility in taking time off to take care of family. Luckily, most of our employees were already working remotely, so we have been able to continue our work fairly seamlessly. We are interfacing with companies, universities, scientists, and investors as much as ever, and we are finding more ways to reach our audiences virtually.
The Humane League
We are working tirelessly to adapt our programs and tactics to the new challenges we face. Until late, in the U.S. we had been running several pressure campaigns against corporations in the hospitality and restaurant sectors. Right now, businesses are struggling to employ people, deal with supply chain challenges, and simply stay afloat. As a result, we have put our campaigns against restaurants and retailers on hold. It would not be appropriate—nor would it be an effective use of our time—to apply pressure right now. However, we have seen new opportunities arise: to stand in solidarity with food supply chain workers who are also demanding change, to target producers directly, to speak out about the connections between animal agriculture and human health, and to further strengthen and innovate the digital volunteer mobilization tactics that have been crucial to our past success.
THL’s campaigns are powered by our vast network of grassroots organizers. For their safety, we’ve canceled all travel and in-person events hosted by our employees and volunteers, including socials, meetups, protests, and other events indefinitely. Instead, we’re hosting virtual meetups and offering up digital actions for supporters to take. As always, our employees are working remotely and collaborating across the globe to maximize our impact for animals. Our international branches in the U.K., Mexico, and Japan, as well as our global partners in the Open Wing Alliance (OWA), each face their own unique circumstances and are adapting their work to their specific contexts. The OWA just hosted its fourth annual Global Summit to End Cages virtually and continues to offer new opportunities for virtual support and community-building to our OWA members.
Compassion in World Farming USA
If anything, COVID-19 has made the mission to end factory farming all the more urgent. Not only are consumers increasingly aware of the impact of where their food comes from, but worker safety and animal welfare are at serious risk as the virus sweeps through meat processing plants, slaughter line speeds continue to increase, and slaughterhouse closures increase the risk of cruel on-farm “depopulation.” Therefore, we remain steadfastly committed to our strategy and mission to end factory farming.
Although much of our work focuses on corporate engagement, we’ve mobilized our supporter base to support legislative efforts toward decreased slaughter line speeds and the pending Farm System Reform Act. While our Food Business and Public Engagement teams have been unable to travel for meetings and filming, we have found alternative ways to engage and have dedicated time to finalizing our sustainable food strategy, which goes beyond incremental animal welfare work and toward systemic change that embraces regenerative agriculture, reduced reliance on animal protein, and a re-envisioned food system that benefits animals, people, and the planet.
Faunalytics
We are constantly examining how our fellow animal advocates are doing during this crisis and prioritizing their needs, now more than ever. Instead of fundraising for our own work during GivingTuesdayNow, we ran a “support campaign.” We shared and promoted our COVID-19 related materials, resources, and key implications for advocates to better support our fellow animal protection organizations that might be impacted more than we have been. We also produced a short video summarizing key takeaways from everything we’ve learned so that advocates can immediately apply data to their campaigns and strategies.
Federation of Indian Animal Protection Organisations
Both the political and social context in which we operate have been altered dramatically. Some of our work with bureaucrats for policy change has taken a hit as politicians and government employees are prioritizing human welfare issues and scrambling to hold the economy together during this extended lockdown. Hence, all of our proposals are stuck at government offices. Compounding this, the Indian government is pro-livestock and intensifying efforts to expand the dairy and aquaculture sector by offering bailouts to these industries. Our movement-building work has also evolved since people have increasingly moved to digital platforms for disseminating information. One trend we have observed as people have been spending more time on social media is the increasing polarization between multi-issue and single-issue activists. On the bright side, interest in our 21-Day Compassion Challenge spiked in May, and reports say people are moving toward plant-based foods in Asia.
Sinergia Animal
We work in the Global South, where the social impacts have been severe, so we invited our followers to donate to organizations fighting against hunger. Our campaign has been more like a symbolic gesture, as so far, specific donations routed via this page totaled less than $500 (USD). We have a low capacity to fundraise with small donors and have plans to start investing more in development to change this reality. This campaign is also part of our strategy to care and advocate for other important causes such as poverty; human rights; the environment; gender equality, LGBTQI+; racial equality; indigenous, workers’, and migrants’ rights; and more. On Women’s Global Strike Day, we posted a video showing this commitment, which was highly appreciated by our followers. Additionally, here is a brief description of the social contexts during COVID-19 in the countries where we operate:
- Indonesia: Almost 3 million people lost their jobs and 70 million are at risk of losing income because of physical distancing. Many are worried about escaping not only from the disease, but also from starvation.
- Thailand: Containment measures have led to extreme insecurity among millions of workers. Some are now surviving on the streets, thanks to free food distributions.
- Colombia: Around half of the population are informal workers. Humanitarian aid and food donations have not been able to help all those who need it.
- Brazil: The social impacts have been devastating. In the shantytowns, 83% were expected to go hungry without help.
- Chile: The number of unemployed workers has increased dramatically. The social programs of the government are not enough.
- Argentina: Around 40% of the population are informal workers. As noted in the article, “poverty expands more and more at the same rate as the virus in poor neighborhoods.” (translated from Spanish)
Sociedade Vegetariana Brasileira
While we had individuals canceling their membership (filiação) due to the economic crisis, we also saw an opportunity to engage with the public through social media as people looked for connection while physical distancing. In the political context, we had a pending parliamentary amendment that would guarantee funding by the government of the State of São Paulo to implement the Meatless Mondays Campaign in public schools, but the amendment was halted and is currently undefined. Financial impacts and social inequality are worsening. On the other hand, solidarity is increasing. Our campaign department has been working in partnership with the corn, soy, and derivatives industry to encourage restaurants and other companies that are distributing food to low-income individuals to replace meat with textured soy protein (which has a much lower cost and is better for handling, safety, and storage). We also assisted with training the cooks from these restaurants on how to utilize soy protein. Finally, we are producing materials to show the benefits of soy protein when compared to meat, especially regarding food security.
Has your funding situation changed, either positively or negatively, compared to previous years?
- What is your year-to-date revenue and how does it compare to your budgeted revenue? Are you under or over budget?
- How long is your runway (how many months of reserves do you currently have)?
- Have donations/grants increased, decreased, or remained steady?
- Has your donor pool changed? If yes, how so?
- Have you curbed any expenses? If yes, what types?
- Did you receive government financial support as a result of COVID-19 (for example, from the U.S. Paycheck Protection Program)?
Albert Schweitzer Foundation
We are likely to have lower spending than anticipated this year. This is due to our campaigning, our fish work, and our legal work slowing down during the crisis, and because we raised salaries later than originally planned. Our 2020 revenue so far is €1.1 million and our spending is €858,000. We had planned to raise €1.0 million and to spend €1.35 million. Our runway is 10 months. Regular donations have slightly decreased, one-time donations have decreased, and major gifts have slightly increased, while our donor pool hasn’t really changed. Beyond the forced slowdown of some of our programs, we haven’t curbed our expenses. We did not receive government financial support.
Anima International
We are currently slightly under our budgetary goal, but revenue is steady and increasing. Until more data on the financial crisis is available, we are operating to our full financial capacity. The only change is that we are more cautious about growing our programs, which is not only due to the financial context, but the pandemic itself. We could keep the organization running for 24–30 months if there is no major financial breakdown. We correct some expenses such as salaries with regard to the economic context (inflation, change in standard of living in the country), so the exact answer would require more detail and explanation.
Our donations have remained steady across all our organizations. In most countries they are increasing, though it’s hard to assess how much we lost counterfactually. The only major hit was to our revenue-generating activities that involved outdoor activities. Our donor pool has not changed. It has not been necessary for us to make any cutbacks so far, though, as mentioned, the pandemic has encouraged us to consider future expenses more carefully. We have not received government funding as a result of the pandemic, but programs are available in many of the countries in which we operate and will probably be used by some of our groups.
The Good Food Institute
Through May our budgeted amount for donations and grants was $6,663,330, and we are running a slight deficit, having raised $5,945,720 (on an accrual accounting basis). GFI’s fundraising goal for this year is $11 million for our general operating fund and $5 million for our research grant program. Our fundraising tends to be loaded toward the back-end of the year, so the impact of COVID-19 on fundraising won’t be fully understood until the end of the year. We’ve experienced a slight decrease in donations, but our donor pool hasn’t changed and we have a runway of at least 12 months. We have curbed our travel and co-working expenses as well as canceled our all-staff retreat, leadership retreat, and the Good Food Conference. Some cancellations resulted in lost deposits and non-refundable airfare. Fortunately, we received a U.S. Paycheck Protection Program loan to offset some expenditures.
The Humane League
Our 2020 budget is $10.8 million. As of the end of May 2020, we have raised $2.5 million in donations and have another roughly $4.5 million pledged from generous donors this year. We also applied for a U.S. Paycheck Protection Program loan to help ensure that we had the cash to keep our staff employed, our mission alive, and to ease the burden on our donors. In May we learned that THL was approved, and shortly thereafter we received a loan to cover current staffing costs for two months. This leaves us with a funding gap of $3 million and will in part make up for the decrease in donations since the start of this crisis. We also maintain a six-month operating reserve.
Donations and grants are down compared to last year-to-date by about $1.1 million, and we have seen roughly 400 fewer people able to give. In addition to the employment changes previously mentioned, expenses for travel and in-person events, such as the Open Wing Alliance Global Summit and our annual staff retreat, have been curbed as we have indefinitely paused activities that put our staff, volunteers, and supporters at risk.
Compassion in World Farming USA
Although a small number of recurring donors were forced to pause their monthly gifts due to pandemic-related financial challenges, our lead-generation campaigns remain on track and successful. Our overall Individual Giving program is slightly behind target, as many communications and digital opportunities for giving were temporarily delayed. We applied for and received government support for staff salaries from the U.S. Paycheck Protection Program. We have also saved on travel costs due to travel restrictions beginning in early March.
Faunalytics
Our year-to-date (YTD) income is $205,876.12, compared to our budgeted YTD income of $173,986.00. We have a little over one year in reserves; however, our runway will be shortened if we see a decline in giving during our year-end fundraising season. We have been planning to spend down our reserves by hiring another research scientist.
Though we received a larger gift from a new donor earlier this year, our donations have otherwise remained more or less steady. Our donor pool is growing slightly, as projected. We’ve curbed expenses that would have been spent on travel and associated costs for the Animal Rights National Conference and our strategic planning retreat. We have not made other cuts at this time, as we already operate on a lean budget. However, we are carefully analyzing the risk of prematurely hiring another research scientist. We haven’t received any government financial support as a result of COVID-19.
Sinergia Animal
So far, we have only curbed expenses with street actions. We expect to have a revenue of $772,000 to $864,000 (USD). (Some funds are under renewal and diligence processes.) We have met our fundraising goals for the year, but we do have room and promising plans for additional funding. Additional funds would be used to increase our capacity to conduct in-depth research and carry out more undercover investigations.
For cage-free programs, which represent around 60% of our revenue and whose funds also support global leadership roles, we have 12 to 24 months (in Asia and Latin America, respectively) of reserves, as these are two-year grants. For other programs, we have reserves for one year, until May 2021. Donations have increased from $597,900 in 2019 to $864,000 in 2020 (a 44.5% increase). These figures include funds that are under approval and diligence procedures in 2020. In 2019, we had nine large donors, and in 2020, we have 14. This includes both individuals and foundations/philanthropic funds. Fundraising with small donors is still a major challenge. We will try different strategies, such as working with multiple intersecting issues, presenting different programs in different ways, running matching campaigns, and launching a monthly donor program to see if this can be improved. Our feeling is that we work in countries where people don’t have a strong culture to make donations. Additionally, currencies are weak.
Sociedade Vegetariana Brasileira
Altogether, we understand that our funding situation has changed negatively, but not severely at this point. Our sources of revenue include memberships, product certifications, events, large donations, and e-commerce. We have lost 91 members (of a total of roughly 2,500) since the beginning of the pandemic. We also closed the online store for two months and had a significant decrease (more than 50%) in demand for product certifications (and had to negotiate many requests for flexibility and the postponement of certification renewal payments). We had to cancel and postpone several events that would have contributed to the sale of products and new memberships.
Despite these losses, we received new memberships due to the webinars and daily live videos on our Meatless Mondays Instagram account, as well as new donations due to the matching donation campaign we held in May (in which a generous donor offered to multiply all donations and new memberships by 10 within 20 days, generating an approximate revenue of $55,000). The matching campaign also widened our donor pool: We received new donations from non-vegans and non-vegetarians due to the Ticking Bomb campaign’s emphasis on the link between meat consumption and the pandemic. Due to the matching donation campaign, we had a considerable increase of donations over a two-to-three month period.
Unfortunately, we expect a decrease until the end of the year and throughout next year. Grants are decreasing, and we are taking longer to achieve results. We have curbed fixed expenses related to the non-use of the headquarters, such as electricity and transportation aid for the staff. We have not received any government financial support but have approximately 10 months of runway.
How will your work be impacted if you do not meet your annual fundraising goal?
Albert Schweitzer Foundation
The overall picture is that COVID-19 put a foot on the brake for spending growth. While it is unfortunate that our work slowed a little, this is not a big issue operationally. We do hope to return to our growth path soon.
Anima International
Not meeting our fundraising goal would mean fewer programs and activities—especially the ones we wanted to grow. Currently, we don’t have an elaborate answer because the data we monitor doesn’t prompt us to consider any drastic changes.
The Good Food Institute
If we don’t meet our annual fundraising goal, we will need to assess how that will impact our programmatic work. Rather than let employees go, we will look for ways to curtail other expenses. Our international affiliates are still in their infancy, and some of their growth plans may need to be delayed if the funding is not there to support immediate growth.
The Humane League
Even as we have grown from a grassroots nonprofit to a midsize nonprofit, every year we still have to make tough decisions about what projects and expenses we can approve to more cost-effectively achieve our mission. That said, this year we will very likely have some cost savings as we have curbed some budgeted expenses. We also have a reserve that we are ready to use if needed.
Given that the U.S. is now officially in a recession, we are especially grateful to ACE and the donors who have supported our commitment to ensuring that we can keep our staff employed and our programs alive by helping us build a reserve. While a loss of funds this year is unlikely to impact our 2020 programs, when we start planning our 2021 budget this fall, we will have to take even more precaution when evaluating our programs for next year. This may result tangibly in fewer in-person meetings with corporations, fewer grassroots mobilization efforts, and fewer trainings with dozens of international OWA member organizations, among other restrictions.
Compassion in World Farming USA
We do not yet know the full impact of the pandemic on our fundraising goals, therefore we are preemptively and actively identifying cost-saving opportunities and areas of further efficiency to put us in the strongest possible position as we continue to navigate this in the mid and long term. Maintaining a supportive work culture and retaining our team members and their unique expertise remain crucial priorities, so we aim to stay as committed to our strategy as possible.
Faunalytics
Currently, Faunalytics is well-positioned. We have seen an increase in income over the last few years and have assets available should 2020 fundraising fall short. However, as mentioned above, we would like to hire another research scientist in the near future, and a decrease in income could impact the timeline for achieving that goal.
Federation of Indian Animal Protection Organisations
We have curtailed our expenses to a bare minimum, given our current context and minimal travel requirements. However, if we do not achieve our annual fundraising goal, our work will take a significant hit, and we may need to shut down some of the programs for which we cannot raise funds. Unfortunately, this may even result in having to lay off some staff to help keep the organization afloat and force us to reduce our work to the most essential tasks in the most essential programs.
Sinergia Animal
Not applicable, as our annual fundraising goal has already been met.
Sociedade Vegetariana Brasileira
Unfortunately, we are predicting that, within this current year, we will not be able to have any training for cooks, and we will not be able to implement the Meatless Mondays program in new institutions. Planning and budgeting for campaigns still in the development stage is also tricky since they have to be adapted to a new reality after the end of social isolation. Such uncertainty creates huge difficulties in campaign building and in applying for new grants. We are concerned that our campaigns and programs might need to shrink in the medium to long term, thereby shrinking our organization as a whole.
How can ACE and our community best support your organization through this challenging time?
Albert Schweitzer Foundation
We feel very well supported currently, thank you. As our work starts to regain momentum, we especially encourage regular donations (no matter what size) as these allow for the best planning in uncertain times.
Anima International
We are very grateful for the support of the community and our donors, now more than ever. While our work continues at full speed despite world events, we won’t know for sure how our finances are affected until later in the year. We thank you all and urge you to stay strong and active for animals during this trying time.
The Good Food Institute
ACE’s continued partnership with and advocacy for its Top and Standout Charities is already a tremendous help to our work. Of course, GFI is incredibly grateful to our donors of all sizes and walks of life. Our family of supporters, which spans every continent, is rising to the challenge and ensuring that we will weather this storm together and continue our work to bring about a sustainable, healthy, and just food system. We appreciate ACE’s support encouraging donors to keep the momentum going.
The Humane League
While every department at THL has had to reassess and refocus its plans for the year, we are committed to gaining significant wins for hundreds of millions of animals in 2020. In fact, in June Tyson announced that they are ending live-shackle slaughter at four more plants, which will reduce the suffering of 227 million chickens every year. We will keep evaluating and pivoting our programs to ensure maximal impact with your time and money, no matter what circumstances we face, to make sure that this work continues unfettered.
There are two highly impactful steps you can take to support our work to end the abuse of animals raised for food. As we face a decrease in funding this year compared to last, if you are able, we ask you to please give whatever financial support you can. Monthly gifts are especially helpful in getting through these downtimes. We have momentum with producers right now, and we cannot let this opportunity pass. If supporting our work with a financial gift is not an option right now—and even if it is—please sign up for our Fast Action Network. This is our community of dedicated online activists who give a few minutes of their time each week to take action; they have been essential to our corporate pressure campaigns’ success. Both of these actions are an effective way to magnify our impact right now.
Compassion in World Farming USA
We greatly appreciate the unique role that ACE plays in the farmed animal protection movement by reviewing and recommending effective charities to potential donors. As we navigate these turbulent financial times, we are prioritizing the shoring up of our core programs of work and associated staff costs. We are hopeful that current, prospective, and (importantly) new monthly donors will be open to helping us remain financially sound, in addition to supporting new workstreams and roles. ACE’s help in reiterating that message would be much appreciated.
Faunalytics
Thank you for your continued support! It would be great if funders communicated their giving intentions for the remainder of the year. Organizations would benefit from knowing if major donors plan on renewing, decreasing, or suspending their gifts (especially year-end giving). Knowing where donors stand will increase our efficiency as organizations make financial contingency plans, contemplate layoffs or new hires, and plan for the next 18 months.
Federation of Indian Animal Protection Organisations
ACE is already supporting us by helping to bring resources to the Indian movement—please keep doing more of that; it is absolutely vital. As explained in our responses to previous questions, we continue to pursue our program targets with renewed vigor even in the face of our current circumstances. As we streamline new processes for remote working and new intervention strategies to achieve our goals, we will need your patience and understanding on the impact these might have on our programmatic targets. Once our FCRA certificate is renewed, funds for various programs from the community will help get us back on track.
Sinergia Animal
ACE has helped us achieve our fundraising goals this and last year. It has also brought us a lot of visibility and recognition internationally. We are immensely grateful for this support and feel privileged to be in a comfortable situation facing this challenging time. The only support we would ask is for ACE’s community to understand that our chances to generate impact during the pandemic are lower, as explained in the previous questions.
Sociedade Vegetariana Brasileira
We are already very grateful for ACE (and to this group of funders of the farmed animal movement) for helping us cross these challenging times. Indeed, further support may be needed to ensure our organization and impact are not compromised. We appreciate any and all opportunities we can have to show our work, history, and plans to potential donors. We also appreciate very much that ACE makes it easier for us to get funds transferred from abroad. Last but not least, we believe we could use advice to enhance our grant applications. We would like to present more straight-to-the-point, logical, and effective applications in order to secure even more opportunities and funding to keep SVB running, to keep SVB strong, and to continue generating the amazing impact we have always had (with relatively few resources) on the environment, people’s health, and farmed animals.
ACE appreciates the time and effort invested by our recommended charities in sharing this information. We hope that you find this overview of how our Top and Standout Charities are responding and adapting to coronavirus helpful when making your giving decisions. To support these effective charities and their efforts to reduce animal suffering around the globe, please consider making a gift to ACE’s Recommended Charity Fund today! Thank you for your continued support of the animal advocacy movement during these challenging times.
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