Research digs up funding facts  

The Trust continues to research needs and priorities in the not-for-profit sector and has recently commissioned work into the housing and environment sectors.

In the housing sector we wanted a better understanding of the issues, particularly  homelessness, housing affordability, housing habitability and emergency housing. We commissioned Gravitas Research to focus on the Auckland and Northland regions, to review available information and interview key groups involved in the sector.

Gravitas’ report confirmed that there are many gaps and shortfalls which leave New Zealanders living in inadequate or inappropriate housing, seeking temporary shelter in boarding houses, hostels and emergency accommodation and, at the extreme, sleeping rough on the streets.
While this will not be news to those working in this area, we think it is important that the information is gathered in one document which is now available as a resource on our website.

The Trust will use the report to guide its social housing policy development and we invite anyone else working in the area to share the resource, which can be downloaded from our website at http://www.asbcommunitytrust.org.nz/research-housing-sector.html

We also joined the Hikurangi Foundation to survey grantmakers this year in an effort to better understand how much money is going to environmental projects.

The survey was part of the Trust’s research leading in to this year’s review of funding for the environment sector.

The web-based survey was sent to 220 grant makers in March 2009, with 33% responding. We found that environmental funding is small – making up less than 3% of annual grants.

Funding was mainly for conservation activities and environmental education, with just over a third saying they gave direct or indirect support for climate change programmes. Climate change funding represented 43% of the total grants to the environment sector.

More results from the survey are on our website: http://www.asbcommunitytrust.org.nz/research-green-grants.html

Our website’s resources section also contains links to other research, including alcohol and drugs education, capacity building, refugee and migrant service funding and Asians and the arts.

We are committed to sharing the results of our research, as we believe this will have a direct benefit for the not-for-profit sector. Please contact us for more details.