The Impact World this Week: 19 December 2025

Global: Green search engine Ecosia is calling for a Climate Nobel Prize – and has provided €1m to fund it. The largest European search engine, which dedicates 100% of its profits for climate action and has planted 240m trees to date, has formally offered the Nobel Foundation to fund the prize, following informal conversations with the organisation, according to Ecosia. CEO Christian Kroll (pictured) said: “When Alfred Nobel established the prizes, he wrote that they should serve the greatest benefit to humankind. Today, that must include climate action.” The economics Nobel Prize was created in 1969, and now it is time for a climate Nobel award, he added. 

• Read more: How to run an activist enterprise and compete with Google

UK: Could it be you? The UK government is looking for 12 members of its newly-created Civil Society Council, an advisory body to the government which will meet quarterly in Downing Street. The council was announced following the launch of the Civil Society Covenant earlier this year, and its purpose is to “work in partnership with government at the highest level to drive and oversee the implementation of this Covenant – helping government and civil society to design and deliver policies and services in genuine partnership”. It will be chaired by Kate Lee, the CEO of NCVO. Experience in the sector, problem-solving skills and an ability to ‘think strategically’ are required – check out the government’s website for more information.  

US: 208 nonprofits have been announced as recipients of US$40.5m of unrestricted grants from the OpenAI Foundation. They include an association advancing voices of Indigenous peoples in the media, a nonprofit exploring how AI can support specialized education and career pathways for neurodivergent learners and an organisation supporting post-9/11 combat veterans through nature-based experiences. The grants are the first distributed by the foundation’s People-First AI Fund, designed to support community-based nonprofits working to strengthen local communities and expand the opportunity of AI. A second wave of US$9.5m will be announced in the coming months, supporting organisations already advancing AI work in areas with potential for “broad public benefit”.

UK: The government’s new planning reforms could disrupt nature markets by slashing the ‘biodiversity net gain’ regime, campaigners have argued. Current law in England requires land developers – for housing or for industry – to show their projects will result in more biodiversity than there was before development, in order to get planning permission. If developers can’t deliver a net gain – for example through planting trees or growing plants on roofs – they are allowed to buy “biodiversity units” from suppliers, creating a whole market of “habitat bank developers” that build new nature reserves and generate biodiversity value. But the government, in a new strategy aimed at facilitating building housing, is planning to substantially reduce the scope of development projects that would be covered by the law, Matthew Pennycook, the minister for housing and planning, said in Parliament this week. The Wildlife Trusts estimate that at least 60% of all planning applications would now be exempt, substantially reducing demand on biodiversity markets. 

• Read more: Building a market for nature: the finance innovators racing to save our ecosystems

Republic of Ireland: “You could get every football club in Europe to zero [carbon emissions] and still barely move the needle on climate.” So says Sean McCabe, the head of climate justice and sustainability at Dublin's Bohemian Football Club. But, he points out, football clubs' influence, through their members and supporters, is huge. “If we can reach them, include them and empower them, we could reshape society.” McCabe was speaking in a video to launch a free toolkit which shares Bohemian FC’s lessons from a three-year programme, called the Spark, which explored how climate action could also build community power and tackle inequality. The project included afterschool programmes, a bike library, a library of things, repair cafes, intergenerational dialogues and community education. McCabe also announced the launch of Bohemian Cooperatives, which will focus on providing practical ways for club members, fans and the wider community to benefit directly from the climate transition.

Global: With Christmas party season upon us, safety on nights out is at the top of many people’s priorities. To help venues, festivals and workers better understand, respond to and prevent sexual violence and all forms of harm in their spaces, Good Night Out Campaign CIC has launched Nightlife Navigator, a free, open-access global resource hub and collaborative library of tools, templates and best practice policies to improve safety. Good Night Out Campaign, which provides accreditation, specialist training, consultancy and public campaigns for safer nightlife, said the Nightlife Navigator is an “open invitation to nightlife organisers everywhere, from independent promoters to major festival organisers, to share what works in their spaces.” 

Global: The race to make the outdoors sports industry more sustainable has seen a flurry of impact reports in recent weeks. First off the blocks was Patagonia’s Work in Progress report, launched to much fanfare in November, which declared “nothing we do is sustainable”. Now, hot on Patagonia’s heels, comes the Re-Action Collective, an international group of organisations committed to making outdoor sports more sustainable, inclusive and accessible, which last week published its Collective Action report. Alongside data about the collective’s finances and work from its founding in 2022 to 2025, the report also includes early-stage reporting on an ongoing initiative called Outdoors 2.0, through which the Re-Action Collective is gathering input on how the sector can prioritise circular kit design, equitable access to the outdoors and events that promote the environments they celebrate. 

• Read more: ‘You can’t compete your way out of a climate crisis’ – Gavin Fernie-Jones, Re-Action Collective co-founder

UK: 1,000 hours of living-wage paid work experience for people facing barriers to employment has been created by Amplify Goods over the past year, according to interim results published this week. The social enterprise, co-founded by WISE100 award-winner Camilla Marcus-Dew, sells low-carbon handwash, lotion and scent products to organisations across the country, while delivering work experience for people who are not yet ‘work ready’ and face challenges such as homelessness and disability. Working with referral partners such as Crisis, Beam, Praxis, Mencap, YourPlace, and New Day, the social enterprise has now generated an estimated £1m in social value for the wider community, according to the report.

• Read more: Amplify Goods launches ‘game-changing’ social enterprise hand wash

UK: Funders, policymakers and ecosystem partners need to shift from short-term fixes to long-term investment in Black-led organisations to make a meaningful, sustainable impact in underserved Black communities. That’s according to Do it Now Now, a pioneering organisation dedicated to empowering Black-led charities, social enterprises and entrepreneurs in the UK. Last week the organisation published The Preparedness Agenda: The State of the UK’s Black-led Impact Organisations in 2025, with its findings based on the experiences and insights of 115 Black-led and Global Majority-led organisations. Other recommendations in the report include: designing funding, finance and support that reflect the realities of grassroots and community-rooted work; recognising lived experience as expertise; and ensuring Black leadership is at the centre of decision-making that affect Black communities.

• Read more: ‘Funders, treat Black-led organisations fairly or accept responsibility for our erasure

England: A new £10m fund launched by social investor Resonance this week will prioritise organisations working in the South West, North West and West Midlands. The Resonance Enterprise Investment fund will provide a range of finance options to social enterprises tackling some of the country’s most pressing challenges, including improving health and wellbeing, reducing economic inequality and the transition to a low-carbon economy. The fund will have the capacity to invest in enterprises across the rest of England if required. Investors including Unity Trust Bank, Enterprise for Development and the Ceniarth UK Foundation, have already pledged to back the new fund.

• Read more: £100m government investment in impact funds would save £1.1bn in homelessness costs, says new research

Bhutan: The world’s first ‘Mindfulness City’ will be funded by the equivalent of US$1bn from Bhutan’s national cryptocurrency reserves. The country’s King Jigme announced the allocation this week. The creation of Gelephu Mindfulness City was announced by the king in 2023 as a new economic hub for the nation (as it struggled with high levels of unemployment and emigration). The city is designed to encompass “conscious and sustainable business, inspired by Buddhist spiritual heritage”, in line with the country’s famous Gross National Happiness philosophy – but with a less strict approach. According to the BBC World Service, Bhutan has been buying cryptocurrency since 2019, but how much money it made from it remains a state secret.

Movers and Shakers

• Martin Avila has been appointed executive director of the European Community Organizing Network (ECON), succeeding Marina Tota. Avila, who co-founded youth charity Xchange Scotland in 2007, was more recently CEO of social enterprise support agency CEIS Group.