Note 1: We will be running final eligibility checks in the next few days, so a few candidates may be removed from the list. I won’t post publicly about removing specific candidates because eligibility in the Donation Election shouldn’t affect your decision on whether to donate to them or not — eligibility is mostly based on whether the charity has the right kind of legal charitable status in the UK or US.
Note 2: Summaries of marginal funding posts are courtesy of ChatGPT- take them with a pinch of salt and let me know if they are wrong.
Global Health
Logo
Charity basics
Bio
What they’ll do with Marginal Funding
ARMoR (Alliance for Reducing Microbial Resistance)
A program that trains local communities to provide mental health care for depression in Latin America.
Individual Support: $233 per person to sponsor participants through the 8-week group interpersonal therapy program, particularly helping vulnerable populations access mental health care
Staff Expansion: $9,600 annually per group facilitator to hire and maintain trained staff who can each manage up to eight therapy groups
Geographic Growth: $50,000 to expand beyond Quito and Otavalo into more rural areas, including recruitment and training of new facilitators to reach their goal of 2,000 people by 2025
A nonprofit incubated by Charity Entrepreneurship focused on reducing depression among youth in India through a guided self-help program delivered via WhatsApp.
Scale the digital-only guided self-help program to reach more Hindi-speaking populations in India
Enhance technology infrastructure to incorporate LLM support alongside human guides
Expand partnerships with WHO and governments to implement the mental health intervention more broadly
Their mission is to alleviate the suffering of non-human animals globally through effective grantmaking.
Fund more high-impact grant applications ($1.5M) and scale up successful past grantees ($1M), particularly in areas like cage-free campaigns and welfare research
Fill funding gaps created by Good Ventures/Open Philanthropy's exit from key areas ($1.75M), especially in shrimp welfare, farmed insects, and wild animal welfare
Expand active grantmaking ($2M) to support strategic initiatives like coordinated fish welfare work and corporate cage-free accountability campaigns in neglected regions
A nonprofit organization that conducts research on ways to improve fish welfare—especially the welfare of farmed fish—and implements interventions based on this research.
Expand remote monitoring capabilities through 1-2 studies on satellite/drone-based water quality monitoring
Scale up the Alliance for Responsible Aquaculture farm program to improve 1M fishes' lives and evaluate water quality improvement methods
Launch China operations by hiring first full-time local staff member to develop species-specific standards and continue field-building work
A nonprofit that works to improve animal welfare standards through corporate outreach, media outreach, and grassroots campaigns.
Expand the Open Wing Alliance (OWA) with $8 million to build regional teams, hire more campaigners, and provide $2-2.4 million in annual grants to member organizations working on cage-free campaigns globally
Grow the Animal Policy Alliance (APA) with $1.5 million to expand from 23 to 30 members and provide up to $750k in grants to support US-based animal advocacy groups
Scale up core support teams (Operations, Communications, Development) to meet the expanded needs of both OWA and APA programs
A nonprofit organization dedicated to advocating for animal rights and promoting a better world for animals, primarily by working towards ending factory farming.
Allocate $20,000 for marketing contractors, social media ads, and video content to grow the platform to 10,000+ users within 12 months.
Dedicate $10,000–$20,000 to hire a fundraising contractor to develop a sustainable funding model and secure diverse revenue streams.
Invest in expert contractors to address critical gaps in marketing and fundraising, enabling long-term growth and impact.
A global community for farmed animal advocates whose mission is to connect advocates across regions to amplify their impact, working towards a vision of ending animal suffering.
Maintain current capacity by funding 2 additional FTE positions ($100,000) to match 2024's staffing levels of 4.5 FTE
Expand operations with 3 part-time regional ambassadors ($40,000) to bridge language and cultural gaps in neglected regions like Africa, Asia, and Latin America
Increase program capacity by upgrading part-time roles to full-time ($35,000) for communications, events, and individual fundraising initiatives
A reader-supported news outlet whose primary mission is to increase public awareness of the welfare of sentient beings, the health of the planet, and human longevity.
Hire a rural reporter ($65,000-$75,000 salary) to expand local news coverage and connect with farming communities
Sustain current operations including fact-checked journalism and disinformation debunking
Support ongoing Public News Service partnership to convert articles into audio content reaching rural audiences
A nonprofit focused on animal and vegan advocacy, aiming to create a world where animals are removed from the food system and other human uses.
Fund Travel Awards to bring 60-100 additional advocates to the Brazil Summit, prioritizing farm animal advocates from underrepresented regions who earn under $30k/year
Improve conference quality through professional public speaking workshops for speakers and enhanced recording quality for YouTube content
Expand the Travel Award Program to increase accessibility for diverse advocates, particularly those from organizations with budgets under $250k
A nonprofit that works to understand and improve wild animal welfare.
Increase annual grantmaking budget back to $2 million, enabling more research funding for wild animal welfare science projects
Pursue additional partnership opportunities with organizations like Conservation X Labs, NYU Wild Animal Welfare program, and various universities (potentially up to 5 or more partnerships)
Expand research output and community-building activities, including developing more scientific publications, hosting workshops, and growing their academic research community
An organization that aims to prevent global catastrophic biological risks by detecting novel agents spreading in the human population or environment.
Hire additional staff, particularly computational researchers to develop detection methods and a partnerships manager to build external relationships
Expand their pilot biosurveillance system to detect engineered threats before 1% of population infection (currently requires ~$470k more annually for wastewater sequencing)
Maintain flexible funding reserves to quickly pursue new promising approaches without needing to raise specific grants first
A non-profit organization focused on ensuring the safety and alignment of artificial intelligence (AI) technologies.
Improve accessibility and outreach with $7k–$25k for a professional website redesign and public release of internal resources, enabling greater global participation in AI safety research.
Expand conference attendance with $20k, supporting additional team members to present and engage with the AI safety community at key events.
Continue critical research projects with $15k–$30k, including AI evaluation methodology advancements and extending work on LLM benchmark testing and risk assessments.
A nonprofit research organization based in Fairfax, Vermont, dedicated to advancing scientific research with a focus on ushering in a 21st-century scientific revolution.
Hire consultants and assistants to accelerate model building
Enable faster literature review and research analysis
Encourages Americans to help bring about an indefinite, global pause on frontier AI development – until we can be confident that the technology is safe for humanity – through education of all stakeholders, including the public and professionals in the industry.
Salaries ($260k/year) to maintain core team of Executive Director, Operations Director, and Organizing Director
Event costs ($7.5-15k/year) for quarterly protests, monthly flyering, and community events
Operating expenses ($24k/year) covering bookkeeping, software, insurance, and payroll tax
A nonprofit dedicated to ensuring that people have enough to eat in the event of a global catastrophe, through research on resilient food, policy engagement, and technology development.
Launch policy advocacy campaigns ($100-250K per country) targeting nuclear winter preparedness in specific countries like Norway, Sweden, Finland, Switzerland, Singapore, New Zealand, or Brazil
Build a refrigerated greenhouse in Australia ($200-400K) to simulate and study nuclear winter conditions for crop viability research
Develop emergency response technologies, including a satellite communications system ($300K) and vital services protection for extreme pandemics ($300K)
A charity that investigates science policy opportunities to improve the management of GCRs in Spanish speaking countries.
Support pandemic preparedness initiatives ($85K-140K total) including hospital protocol analysis with IMSS Mexico, Biological Weapons Convention training paper, and North American trade agreement research
Fund food security projects during sunlight reduction scenarios ($95K-145K total) covering Brazil's vulnerability report and Argentina's tabletop exercises
Develop OECD Emerging Risks Strategy handbook ($100K-150K) to improve government risk management systems and international coordination
An organization that aims to educate students and young professionals about effective giving and encourages them to pledge to donate at least 1% of their income to effective charities.
Hire a fourth full-time employee focused on implementing the growth strategy
Expand corporate workplace events program, which is their fastest-growing source of pledges
Invest in community and partnership events as a new growth opportunity
A think tank dedicated to informing decisions made by high-impact organisations and funders.
Allocate $30,000 to identify policy levers for advancing shrimp welfare in Europe, focusing on pathways to influence EU regulations protecting crustaceans.
Dedicate $100,000 to empirical studies on humane pesticides, aiming to reduce suffering for common agricultural insect species if sentient.
Invest $140,000 in research on cost-effective interventions at the intersection of global health and climate change, targeting donors interested in cross-causal impacts.
A nonprofit set up to study forecasting and epistemics.
Allocate $200,000 to maintain the two-person team and cover operational expenses, ensuring continued development of tools like Squiggle and Squiggle Hub.
Expand efforts in education and outreach within the EA and AI safety ecosystems, leveraging a backlog of product updates and new tools to engage users.
Focus on AI-driven cost-effectiveness modeling, improving automation for simple models and advancing epistemic tools for guiding AI safety efforts.
An organisation that works to organize and fund public journal-independent feedback, rating, and evaluation of hosted papers and dynamically-presented research projects.
Extend baseline operations by 6 months to evaluate ~20 additional research papers ($150,000)
Fund new initiatives including interactive LLM tools ($10k-50k), Pivotal Questions project ($50k), and hire part-time communications director ($30k-60k)
Expand evaluation capacity through increased evaluator compensation ($40k/year), additional research fellows ($10k-20k per role), and support for live events ($5k-10k per event)
Some marginal funding posts are from organisations who haven't applied to be part of the donation election. You can read those here and here.
Note: I am not a malaria expert. This is my best-faith attempt at answering a question that was bothering me, but this field is a large and complex field, and I’ve almost certainly misunderstood something somewhere along the way.
Summary
While the world made incredible progress in reducing malaria cases from 2000 to 2015, the past 10 years have seen malaria cases stop declining and start rising. I investigated potential reasons behind this increase through reading the existing literature and looking at publicly available data, and I identified three key factors explaining the rise:
1. Population Growth: Africa's population has increased by approximately 75% since 2000. This alone explains most of the increase in absolute case numbers, while cases per capita have remained relatively flat since 2015.
2. Stagnant Funding: After rapid growth starting in 2000, funding for malaria prevention plateaued around 2010.
3. Insecticide Resistance: Mosquitoes have become increasingly resistant to the insecticides used in bednets over the past 20 years. This has made older models of bednets less effective, although they still have some effect. Newer models of bednets developed in response to insecticide resistance are more effective but still not widely deployed.
I very crudely estimate that without any of these factors, there would be 55% fewer malaria cases in the world than what we see today. I think all three of these factors are roughly equally important in explaining the difference.
Alternative explanations like removal of PFAS, climate change, or invasive mosquito species don't appear to be major contributors.
Overall this investigation made me more convinced that bednets are an effective global health intervention.
Introduction
In 2015, malaria rates were down, and EAs were celebrating. Giving What We Can posted this incredible gif showing the decrease in malaria cases across Africa since 2000:
Giving What We Can said that
> The reduction in malaria has be
Cross-posted from my blog.
Contrary to my carefully crafted brand as a weak nerd, I go to a local CrossFit gym a few times a week. Every year, the gym raises funds for a scholarship for teens from lower-income families to attend their summer camp program. I don’t know how many Crossfit-interested low-income teens there are in my small town, but I’ll guess there are perhaps 2 of them who would benefit from the scholarship. After all, CrossFit is pretty niche, and the town is small.
Helping youngsters get swole in the Pacific Northwest is not exactly as cost-effective as preventing malaria in Malawi. But I notice I feel drawn to supporting the scholarship anyway. Every time it pops in my head I think, “My money could fully solve this problem”. The camp only costs a few hundred dollars per kid and if there are just 2 kids who need support, I could give $500 and there would no longer be teenagers in my town who want to go to a CrossFit summer camp but can’t. Thanks to me, the hero, this problem would be entirely solved. 100%.
That is not how most nonprofit work feels to me.
You are only ever making small dents in important problems
I want to work on big problems. Global poverty. Malaria. Everyone not suddenly dying. But if I’m honest, what I really want is to solve those problems. Me, personally, solve them. This is a continued source of frustration and sadness because I absolutely cannot solve those problems.
Consider what else my $500 CrossFit scholarship might do:
* I want to save lives, and USAID suddenly stops giving $7 billion a year to PEPFAR. So I give $500 to the Rapid Response Fund. My donation solves 0.000001% of the problem and I feel like I have failed.
* I want to solve climate change, and getting to net zero will require stopping or removing emissions of 1,500 billion tons of carbon dioxide. I give $500 to a policy nonprofit that reduces emissions, in expectation, by 50 tons. My donation solves 0.000000003% of the problem and I feel like I have f
> How the dismal science can help us end the dismal treatment of farm animals
By Martin Gould
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Note: This post was crossposted from the Open Philanthropy Farm Animal Welfare Research Newsletter by the Forum team, with the author's permission. The author may not see or respond to comments on this post.
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This year we’ll be sharing a few notes from my colleagues on their areas of expertise. The first is from Martin. I’ll be back next month. - Lewis
In 2024, Denmark announced plans to introduce the world’s first carbon tax on cow, sheep, and pig farming. Climate advocates celebrated, but animal advocates should be much more cautious. When Denmark’s Aarhus municipality tested a similar tax in 2022, beef purchases dropped by 40% while demand for chicken and pork increased.
Beef is the most emissions-intensive meat, so carbon taxes hit it hardest — and Denmark’s policies don’t even cover chicken or fish. When the price of beef rises, consumers mostly shift to other meats like chicken. And replacing beef with chicken means more animals suffer in worse conditions — about 190 chickens are needed to match the meat from one cow, and chickens are raised in much worse conditions.
It may be possible to design carbon taxes which avoid this outcome; a recent paper argues that a broad carbon tax would reduce all meat production (although it omits impacts on egg or dairy production). But with cows ten times more emissions-intensive than chicken per kilogram of meat, other governments may follow Denmark’s lead — focusing taxes on the highest emitters while ignoring the welfare implications.
Beef is easily the most emissions-intensive meat, but also requires the fewest animals for a given amount. The graph shows climate emissions per tonne of meat on the right-hand side, and the number of animals needed to produce a kilogram of meat on the left. The fish “lives lost” number varies significantly by
Recent opportunities in Building effective altruism
