LEG A CY
Unlike Grantham, whose chief concerns include how a
population explosion in Africa will be supported as global climate change impacts crop yields, Ian Gregg, of the family behind UK bakery chain Greggs, has taken a more local approach to his environmentalism. Gregg has retired from the family business and his current
voluntary work promoting biodiversity is unrelated to the Greggs Foundation he set up in 1987. That foundation supports disadvantaged people in the communities in which Greggs trades—his daughter Fiona is still involved with the foundation. But Gregg has taken an element of this community philosophy into his personal philanthropy, and speaks a lot about the “obvious, to me at least” links between the physical environment and community wellbeing. “I’m a keen countryman… I have seen fish numbers and biodiversity drop, and landscapes suffer first-hand. Just about
“Anything that is not on the critical path is
frivolous in a way,” Grantham says. “Giving to a museum is superficially
admirable, but a complete waste of money if society does not survive in a reasonably stable condition, and I do not think it is even 50/50 now that it will.” Grantham says just 2% of giving goes
These kinds of problems
seem too big for any one
individual to tackle
towards environment-related causes. The UK-based Environmental Funders Network, which aims to increase the amount given to environmental causes, puts the figure at 4%. UK private bank Coutts carries out annual research looking at charitable donations worth more than £1 million ($1.4 million) each. The Million Pound Donors Report 2017 found that of £15 billion such donations made in the UK over the past decade, £147 million, or just under 1%, went directly to environment- related causes. Despite the wider apathy to environmental
giving, family offices do appear to be taking more interest. The Global Family Office Report 2017 found that 42% of family offices donated to environmental causes between 2016 and 2017, an increase of 8% on the previous year. This, however, remains well behind education, which is supported by 74% of family offices. In the US, half the total charitable
deductions go to churches and religious institutions. “How can you work up much enthusiasm
every species you look at, whether it is birds, earthworms, or invertebrates—I could see them declining and the [national agencies] were not really adequately funded, nor able to deal with the issues adequately.” Gregg helped set up what would become the first Rivers Trust
on the River Tweed in the late 1990s. The organisation was formalised in 2004, when there were a handful of grassroots groups, and there are now 60 such trusts. Operating across the United Kingdom and Ireland, they work towards healthy freshwater ecosystems, and assist communities at risk of flooding. Some are a small group of volunteers, others employ up to 20 people. “We found we had a tiger by the tail, it was growing terrific
enthusiasm as a grassroots movement. People were trying to address problems in their own background,” Gregg says. Like many environmental donors, both Gregg and
Grantham argue that the money diverted into other streams of philanthropy—arts, poverty alleviation, health, and religion— is essentially wasted if we continue to trash the planet.
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for providing that your local minister has a Chevrolet to drive to church in?” Grantham says. “There is only 50% left, and we get 2%
for protecting the whole of the environment, biodiversity, and climate change. It is a terrible testimony to the fecklessness of humankind.” Despite making his name as a perceptive
capitalist, he counts the environment among challenges a free market cannot solve. “You have absolutely got to have collective
effort imposed by government regulation. “[Capitalism] cannot deal with
tragedies of the commons—the oceans, the soil, the air. If you leave a corporation free, it will pollute to save money, even if they know it is disastrous. Because they argue: well, if I do not, someone else will.”
ISSUE 72 | 2018
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