12 percent of the funding for Friends of the Earth International comes from the membership dues paid by the member groups, and 0.7 percent comes from sales and donations. Member groups contribute a percentage of their income on the basis of their revenue from two years ago to the international network. This core funding is used to cover the

operational costs of the Secretariat.

subsidies

86.5 percent of our income is subsidies received from government agencies and foundations. These funds are granted 

to us for specific projects and campaigns and for our Membership Support Fund.

membership support fund

Our Membership Support Fund seeks to pool resources and share them across FoE member groups for the following 

objectives: network development, program coordination, capacity building, strengthening national campaigns, and increasing participation in international campaigns.

In 2009, we distributed 995,266 Euros to 32 of our members: Bangladesh, Brazil, Cameroon, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Croatia, Cyprus, El Salvador, England, Wales & Northern Ireland, Ghana, Guatemala, Haiti, Honduras, Indonesia, Liberia, Malaysia, Malawi,Mozambique, Netherlands, Nigeria, Palestina, Papua New Guinea, Paraguay, Peru, Philippines, South Africa, Sri Lanka, Swaziland, Togo, Tunesia, Uganda and Uruguay.

We also distributed 106,142 Euros to the our regional groupings for regional meetings and capacity building.

our funders

Friends of the Earth International gratefully acknowledges financial support from:

• HIVOS
• NOVIB/Oxfam Netherlands
• The Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs (DGIS-TMF/MFS)
• The Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs (Matra)
• The European Union (joint grant with IPS)
• The Sigrid Rausing Trust
• The Swedish Society for Nature Conservation
• The Netherlands Committee for Sustainable Development (NCDO)
• The Isvara Foundation
• The C.S. Mott Foundation
• The Wallace Global Fund
• The Rockefeller Brothers Fund
• The V. Kahn-Rasmussen Foundation

Their financial support has been crucial in strengthening our campaigns and our network.

membership support

FoEI used the analysis and conclusions contained in these reports as a foundation for strong and effective advocacy work around the world. For example, we sent a team of campaigners from FoE USA, FoE Brazil and FoE Haiti to the Inter-American Development Bank’s (IDB) annual meeting in Miami, to present the report and demand that finance ministers and bank officials only use the IDB’s Sustainable Energy and Climate Change Initiative funds for truly clean and renewable energy projects.

During the past two years, agrofuels have been a top advocacy priority for the federation, cutting across almost all of our program areas. During this period, more than 35 FoEI groups in Argentina, Australia, Brazil, Cameroon, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Cyprus, Denmark, El Salvador, England Wales & N Ireland, France, Germany, Ghana, Guatemala, Haiti, Hungary, Indonesia, Korea, Malaysia, Malta, Mozambique, the Netherlands, Nigeria, Papua New Guinea, Scotland, Sierra Leone, South Africa, Spain, Swaziland, Sweden, Switzerland, Togo, Uganda, Uruguay and US, worked in solidarity to achieve this goal.

accomplishments

We received a lot of press attention and succeeded in helping to shift public opinion on agrofuels, not just in Europe but throughout producer countries. The fact that increasing attention has been paid to food production, because of the global food crisis, meant that we were presented with an important opportunity to raise concerns about competition between crops for food and crops for fuel (although we approached this issue cautiously as we believe that the food crisis is driven by many significant factors, including speculation in agricultural commodities, and false solutions such as genetically modified organisms (GMOs) and increased dependence on artificial inputs to agriculture).

Our various activities also reinforced national and regional alliances with social movements fighting for food sovereignty and resisting large scale monocultures, raised FoEI’s profile in debates about energy and climate justice, and contributed to the implementation of FoEI’s Agrofuels campaign internationally.

As a follow up of the FoEI Conference and workshops on Investor/State Dispute Settlement Mechanisms held in Montevideo, in 2007, FoE Uruguay launched the report, “People's sovereignty or corporate interests?". This homes in on the International Centre for the Settlement of Investment Disputes (ICSID), highlighting the way in which this World Bank mechanism is biased towards corporate interests. The report was presented several times in Bolivia, at the CEDIB (Bolivia’s center for documentation and information), at FTFC (the Factory Workers’ Union) in Cochabamba, and at Bolivia’s Press Federation in La Paz: it was received with great enthusiasm, and we succeeded in reaching out to more than 800 organizations. FoE Uruguay was also invited for an audience with senior officials at Bolivia’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs and representatives of the Solón Foundation. In May 2008, Bolivia became the first country in the world to withdraw from ICSID, and Nicaragua, Ecuador, and Venezuela seem prepared to follow its example.

FoE Cameroon published an assessment of the relevance of the different certification mechanisms within the context of Central African forests, in 2007. The main conclusions of this report (with regard to socio-economic aspects, corruption, participation and access to information) also fed into above-mentioned discussion on FLEGT’s Voluntary Partnership Agreements (VPAs).

Through the FoEI Corporates and IFIs campaigns, civil society organizations were able to halt specific harmful projects while employing campaign activities that highlight the systemic tendencies that allow these types of projects to move forward. We provided financial support for local and national activities, and technical assistance on policy research and analysis, as well as bringing international attention to local concerns in order to ensure successful campaigns.

We also accompanied Nigerian communities in their tireless efforts to force Shell and other oil companies to stop gas flaring and other damaging practices connected to oil extraction. FoEI helped twelve Nigerian communities file an official complaint with the World Bank Inspection Panel, for which the Board approved an Inspection, which then took place in July 2007. The final report of the Inspection Panel’s investigation, released in August 2008, outlines serious errors made by the West African Gas Pipeline Company, as it took possession of lands and displaced already-impoverished residents. In its response to the Panel report, the World Bank’s management admits that residents were paid just 10% of the established value of their land. The Panel also validates the complaint that the Bank refused to consider the pipeline’s impact on communities in the Niger Delta, the source of the gas. This is an important recognition of the concerns of FoE groups and communities in the region.

Given the long-term nature of our campaigns to help communities denounce and halt damaging projects in Africa, it is important to maintain momentum and encourage communities. One successful approach has been the sponsoring of community exchanges, where communities that are affected by the same corporation or sector or type of project (gas pipeline or dam, for example) can meet, share experiences, and corroborate that they are not alone. In 2008, we sponsored exchanges among communities from Togo and Mali, Nigeria and Ghana, all of whom are affected by oil companies’ environmental and social crimes.

The Nyeleni Forum was crucial in helping FoEI to frame its Food Sovereignty Program, continue to build its strategic alliance with La Via Campesina, and act more strongly at both the grassroots and international levels. In 2008, around 30 FoEI member groups from Australia, Brazil, Cameroon, Colombia, Costa Rica, Denmark, El Salvador, England Wales & N Ireland, Guatemala, Haiti, Hungary, Indonesia, Japan, Malaysia, Mali, Mauritius, Mexico, Nepal, Netherlands, Nigeria, Paraguay, Philippines, South Korea, Spain, Swaziland, Uruguay and the USA actively participated in FoEI’s Food Sovereignty Program, and worked in solidarity to advance the food sovereignty agenda globally.

accomplishments

In 2008, FoEI's Food Sovereignty Program was able to:

• advance the food sovereignty agenda globally
• strengthen the fight for a GM-free world
• focus on the links between industrial agriculture and climate change
• link trade to food sovereignty and defend territories and land rights from agribusiness
  

FoEI’s CJE program successfully integrated the perspectives of the affected peoples and climate justice movements into member groups’ analyses and political platforms. FoEI brought this perspective to international networks such as Climate Action Network International (CANI), Climate Justice Now! (CJN!) and emphasized it in official UN fora FoEI’s communications strategy focused on mobilizing people around the affected peoples and climate justice agenda. We published a series of case studies and testimonies from nine different communities around the world in our publication 'voices of the communities affected by climate change' which we distributed at all international fora and also use as a movement building resource at the grassroots level. 

An excellent example of our work to empower communities is the Movement of Victims Affected by Climate Change in Central America (MOVIAC) initiative, which continued in 2009. As part of this, more than a hundred representatives of Central American movements, organizations and networks, met in June, in El Salvador. MOVIAC is an invaluable and inspirational component of the Affected Peoples Campaign. Many other FoEI member groups are now inspired to create similar national and regional grassroots movements with affected communities.

FoEI’s work with affected communities also included the Climate School: Building and Mobilizing Climate Justice, which took place on 24 March 2009, in Medellin, Colombia, within the framework of the actions against the Inter-American Development Bank’s 50th Anniversary Annual Meeting, also in Medellin. In addition, a series of community exchanges between communities in Central America has enabled 120 individuals to live in and exchange experiences with other communities challenged by climate change.

FoEI has also focused on developing and deepening key alliances, in order to contribute to building a diverse, effective and global movement for climate justice and energy sovereignty. For the CJE Program this has involved working closely with key social movements such as La Via Campesina and the World March of Women, throughout the year. In particular, we agreed to cohost a joint assembly at Klimaforum09 in Copenhagen, to advance the design of a political agenda that would allow us to move forward in mobilizing and organizing the defence of land. Additionally, we enhanced our cooperation with other coalitions and strategic alliances including Indigenous Peoples’ organizations, Jubilee South, the Global Forest Coalition, Jubilee South, the Durban Group, REDLAR and others.

Key moments in the evolution of these alliances in 2009 included:

• An event, "Talks between Environmentalists and Indigenous Peoples," at the World Social Forum, 31 January 2009, Belem do Para, Brazil. Organized by FoEI and the Global Forest Coalition, these strategic talks between Indigenous Peoples and environmentalists, with over 100 participants, allowed us to advance in the establishment of political agreements and strategic actions to build climate justice and to fight against the exploitation of nature.

• "Environmentalists and Indigenous Peoples united for Climate Justice," at the Foro Andino, in Colombia, 18-19 March 2009. Organized by Friends of the Earth, this event also strengthened the developing relationship between environmentalists and Indigenous Peoples from the Andean region including the U`wa, Wayuú, Nasa, Misak, Quichua and Aymara. The focus of the meeting was the impact of climate change on Indigenous Peoples’ lands and the need to move forward with a shared strategy and joint actions for climate justice.

• The 5th REDLAR Mesoamerican Conference, Boquete, Panama, 22-25 April 2009. FoE was able to promote the idea of combining Energy Sovereignty, Climate Justice and buen vivir  (literally ‘good living’) to the 264 representatives from Mesoamerica and other areas of the continent. This latter concept is central to the social movement and Indigenous Peoples in America, and is referred to as Abya Yala.

• 1st Continental Summit of Indigenous Women of Abya Yala and the 4th Continental Summit of Indigenous Peoples and Nationalities of Abya Yala, in Puno, Peru, 27-31 May 2009. Together with over 5,000 attendees, Friends of the Earth participated in talks, workshops and meetings at both summits. This was an excellent opportunity to contribute to the establishment of the concept of buen vivir and to strengthen ties and move forward with strategies for climate justice.

• Friends of the Earth also participated in the Asia Pacific Peoples’ Solidarity for Climate Justice organizing meeting, to contribute to preparations for the week of civil society activities that took place in parallel to the Bangkok UNFCCC intersessional meeting, 28 September to 9 October 2009.

• At the 1st International Climate Justice Tribunal, Cochabamba, Bolivia, 14-16 October 2009, FoEI presented a case about sugarcane cutters in South-western Colombia to the tribunal, contributing to the debate on environmental crimes, the climate and environmental debt. This case was the direct result of an international mission for the verification of agrofuels in Colombia, which FoEI organized in July 2009, with the participation of more than 40 international delegates. The mission visited five regions in Colombia which have been severely impacted by the expansion of sugar cane and palm oil to produce agrofuels.

• The months preceding COP-15 in Copenhagen involved extensive and improved collaboration with social movements - especially Via Campesina and the World March of Women - and other civil society organizations, around plans for Copenhagen, including the joint Klimaforum events, mobilizations and media work. FoEI also participated in Climate Justice Action preparations, and organized and participated in a Climate Justice Now! strategy meeting in Bangkok in October.

In 2009 FoEI's campaigning on the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) negotiations involved the production and distribution of a substantial number of policy proposals and analyses in the run-up to COP-15 in Copenhagen. A new and rapidly developing focus in this respect is climate finance, a cross-cutting campaign being run with FoEI’s Economic Justice Resisting Neoliberalism (EJRN) program. We developed a robust position paper in collaboration with campaigners from the EJRN campaign, which formed the foundation for much of our campaigning before and during Copenhagen. FoEI also began to contribute to the climate finance debate within the climate justice movement. Nearly 10,000 copies of our climate finance materials, "Financing Climate Justice: Ensuring a Just Agreement on Climate Change," and "Financing Climate Justice: Summary of Demands and Ethical Criteria Matrix" were distributed in Copenhagen, in English, French and Spanish. FoEI’s ethical criteria matrix provides governments with a set of criteria for judging climate financing mechanisms proposed during negotiations.

Thousands of copies of our 2008 publication "REDD Myths: a critical review of proposed mechanisms to reduce emissions from deforestation and degradation in developing countries" were also re-printed and distributed in Copenhagen, as was "Voices from communities affected by climate change." In addition, 5,000 copies of the popular FoEI newspaper, "Climate Justice Times," were also distributed.  

The joint efforts of FoEI and key allies has helped to ensure that a number of governments, such as Bolivia, have officially voiced their concerns about the potential negative impacts of UNFCCC, World Bank and national policies to finance Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and forest Degradation (REDD), especially if REDD is used to support plantations and is funded through carbon markets. As a result of lobbying by FoEI and allies, the UNFCCC’s REDD draft reflected these concerns. A key element in this effort was a side event on the potential impacts of REDD on Indigenous Peoples’ rights and biodiversity and the risks of GE trees, on 3 June, parallel to the meetings of the Subsidiary Bodies to the UNFCCC in Bonn. This was co-organized with the Global Forest Coalition and the International Alliance on Indigenous and Tribal Peoples of the Tropical Forest. Many FoEI member groups have also been informed and thus enabled to participate in national REDD policy discussions currently underway.

During the year we also produced a video trilogy, "Towards Solutions on Sustainable Energy Practices". In addition, we distributed and publicized a Friends of the Earth Europe Study entitled "The 40% Study: Mobilizing Europe to Achieve Climate Justice," which shows that domestic emissions cuts of at least 40% in Europe by 2020 are both feasible and affordable.

This research, combined with our advocacy activities, also allowed us to be particularly effective in persuading governments in many countries in the global North to introduce binding climate change laws that will help to reduce those countries’ carbon emissions. This was especially the case in Europe where FoE has focused on its Big Ask campaign: France, Scotland and the UK passed climate change laws setting emissions reductions targets, and it seems likely that similar laws will soon be passed in a number of other European countries including Austria, Belgium, Hungary, Ireland and Slovenia.

Other member groups have also been very active on climate change. In March 2009, for example, FoE Japan organized an international workshop on climate change impacts and solutions faced by developing countries, with presentations from the Japanese government, the World Bank and several international organizations. FoEI’s involvement focused on showing how climate change and its false solutions are a result of the current neoliberal production and consumption model.

Although Copenhagen was an abject failure, it was a key moment in the intergovernmental debate on mitigating and adapting to climate change, because of the urgent need to agree and develop a successor to the first phase of the Kyoto Protocol before it expires in 2012. FoEI took a team of 400 activists to Copenhagen: some of them were engaged in lobbying and advocacy work within the Bella Center, whilst others were focused on the daily mobilizations and alternative events, including the Klimaforum, which were so important to ensuring governments heard the critical voices of civil society.

From the talks in the Klimaforum, demonstrations on the streets, and actions in the conference centre, the message was loud and clear: any climate agreement must be based on climate justice. This was an important development: before Copenhagen the term ‘climate justice’ was much discussed in civil society meetings but more-or-less unknown elsewhere. During Copenhagen on the other hand, it began appearing frequently in the mainstream media.

We promoted the development of many actions/spaces for campaigning and mobilizing during COP-15 and Klimaforum09. This included FoE Europe’s work developing the Flood for Climate Justice, an extremely successful demonstration which more than 5,000 people from many countries participated in. The event also involved mock carbon traders trying to sell carbon offsets to protestors, and a fake carbon stock exchange. It ended in front of the Danish Parliament with the creation of a massive human banner reading “Offsetting is a false solution.”

FoEI also drew public attention to our positions and alternatives for sustainable livelihoods through both traditional and new creative media activities and actions. During Copenhagen, we posted 37 blog entries and 9 videos on FoEI's You Tube channel, and 300 high-quality images on Flickr. Prior to Copenhagen, we created a website to feature the Angry Mermaid Award which included an animation story on the effect of corporate neglect of climate change on communities in the South: the website had 23,851 views. In Copenhagen's Klimaforum09, we presented an interactive Climate Capsule installation with videos, photos and drawings from around the world. We also conducted outreach on climate change during the international tour of the rock band Radiohead, and produced the graphic novel "Speechless" about the history of economic globalization.

A further key objective for the CJE program is to stop World Bank pollution of the climate debate. During 2009 we continued to monitor and conduct advocacy around the World Bank’s framework on clean energy investment and the emission-trading schemes promoted by IFIs. In September we organized a public forum on climate debt alongside the Intersessional Meeting on Climate Change in Bangkok, and a public forum on climate change and financing. FoEI was co-organizer of an international meeting on Financing Strategy and Climate, along with other networks and organizations including Jubilee South, Focus on the Global South, and Oilwatch. FoEI also supported the production of the FoEI Asia Pacific (APac) region’s first climate publication, "Climate Impacts of the ADB's Business: How the Asian Development Bank Finances Climate Change."

FoE also participated in the civil society campaign to stop governments subsidizing the climate-wrecking fossil fuels industry. In April 2009, we published Public Money for Fossil Fuels in the EU and three EU Member States, to identify the many sources of public investments in harmful industries. In 2009, both the G-20 and the UN made agreements to phase out subsidies for fossil fuels, which will have a positive impact on policies regarding renewable energy.

Some FoE groups are also focusing on private finance and its role in driving climate change. FoE Netherlands, for example, has conducted research into systems for measuring carbon footprints, which was presented during a Banktrack meeting for private banks in Washington. The Climate Working Group of banks involved in the Equator Principles is now organizing workshops to develop and implement such a methodology. The outcome of our activities is that among these banks the question is not 'whether' or 'why' they should measure carbon footprints, but 'how'. FoE Netherlands has also convinced private banks in the Netherlands to commit to improving their energy-related investment policies.

The Climate Justice & Energy Program working areas are:

• Energy sovereignty
• Climate and finance / Carbon and forest markets
• UNFCCC (including REDD), and
• Stopping World Bank pollution of the climate debate.

Cross campaign areas include:

• With the Forests and Biodiversity Program - the REDD campaign
• With the Forests and Biodiversity Program, the Food Sovereignty Program, and the EJRN Program - Agrofuels
• With the EJRN program - Financing and Climate, particularly building a common position at the federation level, including on carbon markets and the Clean Development Mechanism

Coordinators and participants

In 2009, the co-coordinators of the Climate Justice & Energy (CJE) Program were:

• Hildebrando Vélez and Irene Vélez, FoE Colombia
• Joseph Zacune, FoE EWNI
• Stephanie Long, FoE Australia
  

 The CJE Steering Group included:

• For ATALC: Eduardo Giesen, FoE Chile,
• For Europe: Sonja Meister, FoE Europe,
• For Africa: Michael Keania Karikpo, FoE Nigeria
• For North America: Karen Orenstein, FoE US

Groups that participated actively in the CJE Program in 2009 included: Argentina, Australia, Austria, Bangladesh, Belgium, Belgium (Flanders and Brussels), Brazil, Cameroon, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Croatia, Czech Republic, Denmark, El Salvador, England, Wales & N Ireland, Finland, France, Germany, Ghana, Guatemala, Haiti, Honduras, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Japan, Liberia, Malawi, Malaysia, Mauritius, Mexico, Mozambique, Nepal, Netherlands, Nigeria, Norway, Palestine, Papua New Guinea, Paraguay, Philippines, Poland, Scotland, South Africa, Spain, South Korea, Sri Lanka, Swaziland, Sweden, Switzerland, Uganda, Ukraine, Uruguay and the US.

In 2008, the food crisis in Haiti meant that large quantities of food were imported into the country as humanitarian aid. In most cases, no information was provided on the nature of the products, including whether or not they contained GMOs.

what happened?

FoE Haiti worked to raise public awareness of the harmful impacts of GMOs on human health, agriculture and the environment. They also worked to reinforce local food production in Savane Brulée, where they were already working with the community to build rainwater harvesting systems and help people adapt to climate change.

FoE Haiti produced and distributed training materials on GMOs, and organized events to inform and mobilize people on the GM issue.

They also distributed locally grown seeds for planting in the next farming season. Unfortunately, this crop was largely ruined by the hurricanes. FoE Haiti assisted the affected communities after the hurricanes, by providing locally produced food and other necessities.

FoE Haiti helped with the production of maize, and when this was harvested in November, they organized the storage of part of the crop for planting in spring 2009.

what changed?

People in Savane Brulée are now well informed about the risks of GMOs. Women were particularly involved in all the awareness raising activities.

The community now has a seed store, and a system to ensure that seed is saved from each harvest to enable other smallholders to develop their farming activities.

One of the most positive impacts has been the growth of community solidarity and mutual aid in a difficult period. Women in particular were involved in distributing locally grown food to hurricane victims.

what next?

FoE Haiti has put a framework in place to ensure the project continues. They have set up a committee to oversee the seed store, and have submitted a proposal to the FoEI Membership Support Fund to extend the rainwater harvesting project.

what happened?

The project was run with the full participation of the community. A management committee made up of five community representatives, including two women, worked with FoE Haiti throughout the process. The committee chose the locations for the cisterns and set criteria for their construction. Villagers also worked in the construction phase, fetching and carrying materials and carrying out the building work.

The initial plan for four cisterns was increased to five, meaning that more people are benefiting. The 12m3 cisterns are located near people’s homes. Corrugated metal sheets were installed on nearby roofs to catch the rain, with guttering to carry the rain from the roofs to the cisterns.

A six-day practical workshop was held, covering water management and the building of cisterns, vegetable growing and the production of organic fertilizer. It was well attended and people were very interested. Two professional trainers worked with the local people.

Composting was initiated, to provide a fertilizer for local farmers, and seeds were supplied to support farming in the dry season. These were grown in a nursery for transplanting into the fields (unfortunately several plots were affected by hurricanes).

what changed?

“The project has had a positive impact on the residents of La Biche/Savane Brulée. People no longer have to go to the trouble of transporting water from distant supply points. Thanks to the availability of water, market gardening is going to be greatly extended here.” sais Aldrin Calixte, from FoE Haiti. The cisterns have proved really useful, and immediately showed their worth during the recent hurricanes.  The community was very motivated by the project, and villagers were enthusiastic about joining in the work. Women were as involved as men in planning the project, and  especially women and children, do not have to spend so much time and effort carrying water.

what next?

FoE Haiti is working with the community to establish new plant nurseries to replace those damaged by hurricanes.

This project could be presented as a successful model of adaptation to climate change. The participative approach used in planning and executing the project was a particularly strong point, and could be a source of learning for projects in other parts of the country.

with thanks to our funders: the dutch ministry of foreign affairs (dgis)

In particular, campaigners urged the IADB to stop lending money to the big companies behind the lucrative ethanol business that some say is partly to blame for soaring food prices. As riots over the cost of living broke out in impoverished Haiti, the IADB announced increased funding of ports, sugarcane mills and other biofuel ventures throughout Latin America, citing plant-based fuels as a crucial counterweight to climate change and rising energy prices.

"The bank's aggressive promotion of biofuels may be good for corporations, but it's a bad deal for farmers, indigenous people and the environment in Latin America," said Kate Horner of Friends of the Earth United States.

According to Lucia Schild Ortiz of Friends of the Earth Brazil,  investors -- many of them foreign -- have been buying tracts of land in Brazil for agrofuels, pushing up prices and driving away the small-scale family-based farms that supply up to 60 percent of the country's food.

In Haiti, the poorest country in the Americas, organizations like the IADB are eager to promote projects that cultivate jatropha, a plant capable of surviving in the country's denuded wastelands and also of producing an oil in its nuts that can be used as fuel. "Why don't they use it to produce more food?" said Aldrin Calixte of Friends of the Earth Haiti.

In 2008, we conducted many activities to support the development of our member groups, as we understand that the strength of FoEI lies in the strength of our member organizations, their capacity to win victories at the local and national level, relate their struggles in a global context, and act in solidarity with fellow member groups in other countries and across regions.

Our Membership Support Fund seeks to pool resources and share them across FoE member groups for the following objectives: network development, capacity building, strengthening national campaigns, and increasing participation in international campaigns.

In 2008, we distributed 1.22 million Euros to 35 of our members: Argentina, Australia, Bangladesh, Brazil, Cameroon, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Croatia, Cyprus, El Salvador, Georgia, Ghana, Guatemala, Haiti, Honduras, Indonesia, Malaysia, Mauritius, Nepal, Netherlands, Nigeria, Palestina, Papua New Guinea, Paraguay, Peru, Philippines, Sierra Leone, Slovakia, South Africa, Spain, Swaziland, Sweden, Togo and Uruguay.

In addition to this fund, other membership support activities in 2008 included facilitation and accompaniment of regional development, particularly in Asia Pacific and Africa. FoEI provided strategic support and facilitation assistance during regional meetings and in setting up regional structures, as well as one-on-one support to member groups in those regions to encourage their participation in the international federation. 

Other areas of membership development are the facilitation of relationship building among member groups across regions; helping to overcome language barriers through timely translations; creating spaces for sharing experiences, such as exchanges and gatherings; and ensuring that member groups are present in the federation and don't fall off the map.