Funding Practices In Farmed Animal Advocacy
Funders shape social movements not only through what they choose to support, but through how they structure that support — the processes, norms, and relationships that define grantmaking. In the farmed animal advocacy movement, a global network of organizations working to reduce, reform, and replace the use of animals in the food system, conversations about funding tend to focus on which organizations and strategies deserve support. The question of how funders actually operate, and what it feels like to be on the receiving end of their practices, has received far less attention.
This report from Stray Dog Institute — itself a funder in the movement — aimed to help fill that gap. According to the authors, it’s the first study to systematically collect grantee perspectives on grantmaking practices in the farmed animal advocacy movement. Because power asymmetries make it risky for non-profits to critique their funders directly, the study sought to capture the kind of candid feedback that rarely surfaces through normal channels.
Semi-structured virtual interviews were conducted with 34 fundraisers from farmed animal advocacy organizations. Participants were recruited through widely used movement platforms, primarily the Farmed Animal Strategic Team and Hive Slack communities, and selected to represent a range of geographic regions, organizational budget sizes, intervention types, and years in operation. To protect anonymity, an independent researcher managed all recruitment, conducted the interviews, and anonymized negative mentions of funders before sharing transcripts with the study team. The researchers then used thematic analysis to identify recurring patterns across the interviews, coding each transcript independently and resolving disagreements through discussion.
The sample skewed toward Global North organizations (21 of 34 participants) and larger-budget organizations (20 of 34 participants), reflecting both the English-language format and recruitment through Global North-hosted networks. The authors caution that the findings represent themes in grantee experience rather than statistically generalizable conclusions, and describe frequencies using rough proportions throughout.
The report identifies six core insights. First, clear and proactive communication of funder priorities, timelines, and requirements saves time for everyone. Yet, about one in four participants reported frustration with unclear funder preferences in application processes, and roughly three in five described decision timelines as unclear or inconsistent. Flexibility is also important: smaller organizations (budgets of less than $250,000) and those based in the Global South were disproportionately burdened by rigid processes. Many appreciated when funders simply accepted materials the organization had already produced rather than requiring custom submissions.
Second, a majority of participants experienced funding decisions as opaque. Over half said they didn’t understand how decisions were made, and only one in five described genuine transparency. Three in five said that receiving even basic feedback on a rejected proposal would meaningfully improve future applications. What they found least useful was boilerplate language like being told a funder had “received many excellent applications” or simply “gone in another direction.” Many also recognized the burden feedback places on funders and weren’t asking for lengthy individualized responses — just enough to calibrate their efforts.
Third, Global South grantseekers face compounding structural disadvantages. These include the costs of traveling to Global North conferences to access funder networks, eligibility requirements that exclude organizations not incorporated in the U.S., the burden of educating funders about regional contexts, and pressure to adopt Northern advocacy strategies that may not translate locally. Just one in four Global South participants felt that power dynamics hadn’t substantially affected their work, compared to one in two Global North participants.
Fourth, strong funder-grantee relationships, characterized by transparency, honest communication, and thought partnership, were consistently valued, but this sense of safety was unevenly distributed. Nearly three in four Global North participants felt comfortable admitting mistakes to funders, compared to fewer than one in three Global South participants. A similar pattern was observed for smaller versus larger organizations, with participants from larger organizations much more likely to report feeling safe than those from smaller organizations (roughly seven in 10 compared to just over one in three).
Further, more than seven in 10 participants described funder dynamics that felt constraining or coercive at some point, most often as pressure to shift programmatic priorities away from what they believed was most needed.
Fifth, participants strongly preferred unrestricted and multi-year funding. This came up explicitly in over half of interviews. Short grant cycles were widely criticized for undermining staff retention, organizational stability, and long-term program development. Many participants connected unstable funding directly to reduced impact for animals, since so much organizational capacity goes toward managing the funding cycle itself rather than the work. Several noted that some funders remain wary of covering operational costs like salaries and overhead, a frustration that echoes a well-documented myth in the broader philanthropic sector, where low overhead is sometimes treated as a proxy for organizational effectiveness despite little evidence to support that assumption.
Sixth and finally, non-monetary support, including learning opportunities, introductions to peers and other funders, tools, and encouragement, was valued alongside financial grants. This was described as extending the impact of the grant relationship. Learning opportunities were the most frequently cited form, mentioned in roughly half of all interviews, followed closely by funder introductions and in-kind contributions like software or research access. Emotional encouragement came up less often but was described as having an outsized effect on morale, particularly for organizations in under-resourced contexts. Participants consistently emphasized that non-monetary support is most effective when funders ask what organizations actually need rather than assuming.
The study has important limitations. The sample is small and not proportionately representative of the broader landscape of farmed animal advocacy organizations. Global South organizations and smaller-budget groups are likely underrepresented. Because participation required awareness of the study, English-language proficiency, and staff capacity to engage, the voices of the most under-resourced organizations may be the least present. Also, the findings reflect grantee perspectives only; funders’ views and constraints aren’t captured here.
For animal advocates, this report offers a rare and unusually candid look at the structural dynamics that shape what advocacy work gets funded, how it gets done, and who gets to do it. The finding that funding often flows through informal networks — and that smaller and Global South organizations face substantially higher barriers to accessing those networks — has direct implications for the geographic and strategic reach of the movement. When funders’ processes favor the familiar, proven, and well-connected, the full range of approaches needed to reduce animal suffering globally may go unsupported. Advocates and movement organizations can use this report to call for more equitable and effective funding practices, including clearer communication, meaningful feedback on rejections, multi-year general operating support, and genuine openness to locally designed strategies.
This summary was drafted by a large language model (LLM) and closely edited by our Research Library Manager for clarity and accuracy. As per our AI policy, Faunalytics only uses LLMs to summarize very long reports (~50+ pages) that are not appropriate to assign to volunteers, studies that contain graphic descriptions of animal cruelty or animal industries, and research on niche topics. We remain committed to bringing you reliable data, which is why any AI-generated work will always be reviewed by a human.
