Keepers of the Earth Fund (KOEF) is an Indigenous-led fund within Cultural Survival, which is designed to support Indigenous Peoples’ community advocacy and development projects. Since 2017, we have supported 238 projects in 38 countries through small grants and wrap-around support. In 2022, we celebrated a milestone of 1 million dollars provided in small grants directly to Indigenous communities, collectives, organizations, and traditional governments to support projects designed by them and in accordance with their Indigenous values.

KOEF provides on average, $5,000 USD grants to grassroots Indigenous-led communities, organizations, and traditional governments in their self-determined development projects based on their Indigenous values. Predicated on the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (UNDRIP), Cultural Survival uses a rights-based approach in our grantmaking strategies to support grassroots Indigenous solutions through the equitable distribution of resources to Indigenous communities. 

The funded projects address the diverse needs of Indigenous Peoples. We collaborate with projects focused on the following topics and their intersections: leadership of Indigenous women and youth; political, economic, and food sovereignty; Free, Prior and Informed Consent; self-governance; land and water rights; land titling, tenure, and stewardship; agroecology; environmental and biodiversity protection; climate change; carbon sequestration; intergenerational transmission of traditional knowledge; Indigenous language, culture and knowledge revitalization; movement-building, and Indigenous participation and representation in local, regional, national and international spaces. 

Learn about our current and previous grant partners: 

Contact

For questions contact: koef@cs.org.