The Health and Environmental Funders Network (HEFN) is a network of grantmakers investing at the intersections of health and the environment. Members of HEFN are expected to share a commitment to its mission and values.
Mission
HEFN's mission is to mobilize philanthropy to accelerate solutions for environmental health and justice. To do this, HEFN supports and grows a community of grantmakers to build knowledge, leadership, and power for environmental health and justice.
Values
HEFN's values are concretely articulated in its priorities, namely to:
- Embed environmental health and justice in key decisions;
- Ensure those most impacted have a meaningful voice in decision making; and
- Improve environmental health outcomes, especially for the most vulnerable.
HEFN and its members share values of:
- Improved health outcomes for people, communities, animals, and ecosystems.
- Environmental protection of the air, water, and land on which all life depends.
- Environmental justice and racial, gender, and social equity, critical for ensuring equal protection from environmental health hazards and having critical voices in decision-making affecting conditions in which people live, learn, work and play.
The HEFN community in its operations also shares values of:
- Science and knowledge, respecting contributions of information and insights from many quarters towards improved understanding and action.
- Information-sharing and collaboration as useful processes to improve philanthropy’s cumulative contributions towards resolution of critical social problems.
- Interdependence, recognizing the profound connections between the well-being of people, communities, wildlife, ecosystems, and the planet.
- Diversity as a critical dimension of equity and as a fundamental strength in efforts to promote environmental health and justice.
- Civility and respect in all interactions and relationships.