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Web tool ranking green developments launched

Fundraising | Celina Ribeiro | 12 Sep 2008

Donors concerned about the carbon footprint of their philanthropy have been given a new internet tool to ensure their money goes to projects that have the least negative impact on climate change.

Washington-based GlobalGiving has launched GlobalGiving Green, a system which scores social enterprises and small scale developments around the world according to their environmental impact.

“The goal is to set the standard for evaluating grassroots, on-the-ground projects against criteria that take into account both environmental and other development-related ‘co-benefits’,” said GlobalGiving chief executive Dennis White. “With this additional layer of screening, people who want to ‘give green’ have the information to do so quickly and easily.”

The green scoring framework was developed by GlobalGiving in collaboration with emissions reduction market specialists EcoSecurities. The system grades projects according to how they work to reduce climate changing emissions, whether they provide sustainable economic growth, their support of the culture and environment of the communities in which they operate and their education of future generations in relation to environmentally sustainable practices, among other criteria.

GlobalGiving Green is billed as the first market-based incentive for grassroots environmentally-sustainable development, claiming that it helps such projects which normally would not attract funds from offset retailers to thrive and compete.

‘Green’ has been created in response to growing consumer and donor demand for information about how their financial decisions impact on climate change. It plays on the fact that many of the communities in which these projects are underway are the most vulnerable to the negative impacts of global warming.

GlobalGiving is set to launch in the UK in September this year, with the Sharath Jeevan from the UK project expressing interest in offering the Green tool to UK users in the future.

The website was established in 2002 in Washington and connects project leaders directly with donors, who search the GlobalGiving database for causes they support. The group has delivered more than US$11m to around 1000 projects since its inception.

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Who's Who: Celina Ribeiro