The US-based Rockefeller Foundation is reopening its Latin America and the Caribbean regional office for the first time in twenty years. 

Colombia will host the regional office from 2025 onwards. A new vice president will also be appointed to help establish a team.   

The Rockefeller Foundation first opened its Latin American and Caribbean office in the 1930s, with a focus on rural communities, higher education and improving health and agriculture. In the early 2000s, the foundation closed its office, though continued to fund projects in countries including Barbados, Brazil, Colombia, Ecuador, Guatemala, Guyana, Honduras, Mexico, Nicaragua, and Trinidad and Tobago.

The announcement is part of Rockefeller’s mission to invest over $1 billion across five years to boost climate transitions and adaptability.  

Former Colombia president Juan Manuel Santos has urged philanthropy to seize the moment.  

‘We have a window of opportunity over the next several years to support the region and its leaders in catalyzing a period of green, inclusive growth, not only to improve our development, but to save the planet,’ says the former president and current trustee of the Rockefeller Foundation.  

The Latin America and Caribbean region will host landmark climate events in late 2024, including the 16th meeting of the Conference of the Parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity on October 21 to November 1, in Colombia. 

A summit of the G20 will take place in Brazil from November 18 to 19, followed by the highest profile climate summit, the United Nation’s Conference of Parties to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (COP30) also taking place that same month in Brazil.  

In June 2024, the Rockefeller Foundation announced its first cohort of the ‘Big Bets Climate Fellows’ programme, designed to help Latin American climate leaders to scale up their local-led climate solutions.

Shafi Musaddique is the news editor at Alliance Magazine.