UK registered charity · Established 1988

Protecting the natural world — and the future we all depend on.

Foundation for Gaia is a UK registered environmental charity working to protect nature and confront the climate crisis. We bring environmental concerns, and the communities closest to them, to the United Nations and the decisions that shape our future.

Our work → About the Foundation

Our mission

We work from the conviction that lasting environmental protection depends on the knowledge and participation of the communities who live closest to these ecosystems — and that their knowledge belongs where environmental decisions are made.

An Arhuaco man in the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta, Colombia

Our status at the United Nations

A place at the table means little unless you make room for others.

Foundation for Gaia holds UN ECOSOC consultative status. We use it to open doors at the United Nations.

We accredit community representatives, arrange their meetings with governments, and help representatives speak for themselves in the rooms where environmental decisions are made. Since 1988 we have worked with groups from Nepal and Tibet to the Arhuaco people of Colombia and the Berber community of Niger.

How we work at the UN →

What we do

Three connected areas of work.

Each is grounded in environmental education, in advocacy at the international level, and in the participation of those closest to environmental harm.

Education & awareness

Environmental education and awareness

We build understanding of the environmental and climate crisis, and of the international mechanisms that shape environmental policy, equipping communities, advocates and the public to engage them, and raising awareness among decision-makers of the issues that matter most.

At the UN & COP

Advocacy at the UN and COP

We bring environmental and climate concerns to the United Nations and the global climate talks (COP) through statements, submissions and side events, and make sure the knowledge of those closest to the crisis is part of the conversation.

With States

Engaging decision-makers

We work with States, institutions and civil society to press for concrete action: upholding environmental obligations, strengthening climate and environmental policy, and advancing the right to a clean, healthy and sustainable environment.

See how we work →

The people who defend the natural world must be heard where its future is decided.

The principle at the heart of our work