NAB Foundation and grants

A few key results

$12.6m

Invested in grants to date.

14 strategic partners

focused on addressing family and domestic violence, financial shocks, environmental wellbeing and building the social enterprise ecosystem in Australia.

Partnered with

the Victorian State Government and Sacred Heart Mission to expand the 'Journey To Social Inclusion Program' to address chronic homelessness.

Want to get in contact with the NAB Foundation?

Email us

The NAB Foundation is not currently seeking applications and we do not take unsolicited proposals for funding.

Why is this important?

The NAB Foundation is the philanthropic arm of National Australia Bank (NAB). Our vision is to back the social innovators who move Australia forward. Through our giving and investment approach, we aim to demonstrate new and innovative ways to use philanthropic capital for greater societal impact.

To achieve our vision, we are:

Directly supporting new and different ways of addressing issues strategic for the bank, our customers and the communities where we operate. Our grants help both not for profits and social enterprises to incubate and scale new, innovative and sustainable ways of solving problems. Our funding focus is in the areas of mental health, domestic and family violence, financial resilience, environmental wellbeing and supporting initiatives to build the social enterprise ecosystem in Australia.
Undertaking discrete impact investments and overtime, investing our underlying assets with a clearly articulated socially responsible investment position.

We take a long-term, collaborative approach to our partnerships and want to make a positive and lasting impact on the organisations that we partner with. Beyond grants and investments, we also provide valuable in-kind support such as communications advice, business mentoring, capacity building and access to the skills and resources of the wider NAB Group. Measuring outcomes is also a priority for us - we want to work with organisations that seek to measure their outcomes and understand how they’re making a difference, and we can support organisations on that journey.

About our grant focus

With a key focus on fostering social innovation and backing innovators, since 2016 we have supported organisations and initiatives in the areas of:

Domestic and family violence – we know this issue can affect anyone and is one of the most common forms of violence against women and children in Australia. Through our grants, we support work in prevention, early intervention and improvement in support to victims. Domestic and family violence Read more about NAB’s Domestic and Family Violence work here.
Financial resilience – financial shocks are unexpected expenses and drops in income, and for Australians they are all too common, with around two in three Australians experiencing some financial hardship during their life. Our grants direct technology, innovation, and talent toward addressing this important issue and we support innovators who are helping Australians prepare for and weather the financial shocks that all of us experience in life. Read more about NAB’s work around financial inclusion and resilience here.
Environmental wellbeing - regional communities are dependent on the good management and preservation of the natural resources they rely on. Through our grants, we support regional communities to better manage their natural resources and promote biodiversity in the face of challenges such as declining access to water, water quality, land degradation and climate change and work on solutions to some of these complex issues.

We have two grant types within each category above:

Thrive grants - for organisations with proven models or solutions, these grants help initiatives or organisations to become sustainable, to scale or collaborate and move to their next stage of growth;
Seed grants - for early stage initiatives or organisations, these grants are ‘seed’ funding for building, testing or piloting an innovative idea, or for funding core operations and organisational capacity.

More recently, we have focused on supporting initiatives to build the social enterprise ecosystem in Australia.

We are not currently seeking applications and we do not take unsolicited proposals for funding.

Australian Land Conservation Alliance (ALCA)

With many of Australia’s most threatened plants and animals living on private land, the role of private landholders and land trusts are crucial to conservation efforts. The NAB Foundation's thrive grant will support a significant scaling up of the Australian Land Conservation Alliance (ALCA) from an unincorporated alliance to a stand-alone entity that leads a network of most of Australia’s major private land conservation organisations enabling greater collective impact on national conservation issues.

Australian Wildlife Conservancy

Australian Wildlife Conservancy (AWC) is Australia’s largest owner of private land for conservation, managing more than four million hectares of land, protecting some of the largest remaining populations of many endangered species. This project trials an innovative idea – a joint venture between the not-for-profit sector (AWC) and an indigenous organisation (Dambimangari Aboriginal Corporation) to deliver, in an integrated way, improved conservation and socio-economic outcomes. The initiative, which NAB Foundation is supporting with a seed grant, will see joint-management of nearly 800,000 hectares along the Kimberley Coast in Western Australia an area of international significance and the only section of mainland Australia to have suffered no extinctions. This unique model will provide a model for use throughout Australia.

Infoxchange

Infoxchange is a not-for-profit, social enterprise that has delivered creative technological products and services to tackle social challenges within the community for over 25 years. The organisation strives to solve family violence, homelessness, mental health and issues facing people with disabilities, the elderly, Aboriginal, Maori and Pasifika communities through smart and efficient technology. These tools range from nation-wide service coordination systems to IT advice for individual organisations, including the interactive mobile information tool ‘Ask Izzy’.

The NAB Foundation's thrive grant supported the enhancement of ‘Ask Izzy’ (an interactive mobile information tool), which seeks to connect people experiencing or that have experienced domestic and family violence with essential services. Ask Izzy has been co-designed with people who have experienced domestic violence, homelessness and the services sector. With a listing of over 360,000 services, including information on housing, money help, health, support and counselling across Australia in urban, regional, rural and remote locations. The enhancements ensure that ‘Ask Izzy’ meets the needs of people experiencing family violence – that it is safe, relevant and accurate.

Odonata

The NAB Foundation is supporting the establishment and growth of Odonata, a not-for-profit social enterprise, by supporting core operations enabling them to scale their environmental and social impact and demonstrate the benefits of doing business with biodiversity. Overtime, Odonata seeks to develop commercial agriculture models that integrate biodiversity as core production system. The project will build the capability of understanding and the integration of biodiversity into farming practices and production.

Our Watch

Our Watch is a not for profit organisation, established to drive nationwide change in the culture, behaviours and power imbalances that lead to violence against women and their children, with a vision for an Australia where women and their children live free from all forms of violence.

The NAB Foundation's thrive grant is supporting Our Watch to deliver the Voices for Change project which builds survivor advocacy work, by enabling women who have experienced violence to share their stories with the public through the media, as a way to build a shared understanding of violence against women. Our Watch are supporting three grassroots organisations; Engender Equality in Tasmania, Micah Projects (Brisbane Domestic Violence Service) in Queensland, and YWCA Canberra in partnership with Domestic Violence Crisis Service in the Australian Capital Territory. The grant allows the three organisations to propel their survivor advocacy work, and connect to organisations supported through Commonwealth funding; leading to more accurate reporting, empowerment of victim-survivors and deeper community understanding of the evidence-based drivers of violence against women. The grant further allows Our Watch’s survivor advocacy work to have activity in every state and territory bar the Northern Territory.

Our Watch continues the legacy of the Luke Batty Foundation (a previous NAB Foundation partner) through its survivor advocacy work.

Reef Restoration Foundation

The Reef Restoration Foundation (RRF) were the first organisation granted a permit by the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority, to establsh a pilot offshore coral nursery in the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park at Fitzroy Island, Cairns in December 2017. This innovative nursery and reef restoration pilot was developed to accelerate the recovery and strengthen the resilience of high value coral reefs to future bleaching events by collecting corals that are naturally more tolerant to higher water temperatures and growing them on offshore nursery frames. This process, which mimics nature, and is similar to taking cuttings from healthy plants to create new plants, is used in the Florida Keys and Caribbean, where over 25,000 corals are grown and planted per year. The NAB Foundation's seed grant will provide RRF, a new not-for-profit social enterprise, help it achieve its aspiration to grow and plant similar amounts of coral in high value locations throughout the Great Barrier Reef.

Sacred Heart Mission

Every day, Sacred Heart Mission assists hundreds of people who are experiencing homelessness or living in poverty to find shelter, food, care and support. Since opening their doors in 1982, they’ve been serving the most disadvantaged members of the community in the City of Port Phillip area. But their research, policy and advocacy work aims to address the underlying causes of deep, persistent disadvantage throughout Australia.

Through the provision of a philanthropic “guarantee” (contingent grant), the NAB Foundation supported an Australian-first deal, arranged by NAB Capital Markets, which takes Sacred Heart Mission’s proven and innovative 'Journey To Social Inclusion Program' (J2SI), and expands it through a unique and bold partnership with the Government, the social services sector, investors and philanthropists, including the NAB Foundation.

The NAB Foundation supported this investment because we are committed to demonstrating new ways to use philanthropic capital for maximum impact. The transaction shows the strategic role of philanthropy to enable innovative social finance deals to be undertaken and puts NAB Foundation at the forefront of that discussion.

StartSomeGood

StartSomeGood run a crowdfunding platform to support social entrepreneurs, citizens and non-profit groups with new ideas to raise the funds they need to create a positive impact for their communities and our planet. As part of the NAB Foundation’s work to grow the social enterprise and innovation ecosystem in Australia, we are supporting StartSomeGood with operational funding enabling them to invest in learning and technical infrastructure.

Sydney Children's Hospitals Foundation

Sydney Children’s Hospitals Foundation exists to fund ground-breaking research and everyday clinical care at Sydney Children’s Hospital, Randwick. Their vision is to ensure that every child now and in the future can access world-class medical care whenever they need it. They fund the vital clinical care that these children need now, so they have the best possible treatment and hospital experience and they also invest in research that will change and save more lives in the future.

The NAB Foundation's thrive grant is supporting the Interdisciplinary Reparative Project (IRP) within the Child Protection Counselling Service (CPCS). IRP is a new model of intervention that aims to promote safety, reduce the impact of harm and improve the well-being of children and young people, in the hope of decreasing intergenerational violence and domestic abuse. This is a world-first program that supports recovery from complex childhood trauma through a new relational model that combines a counselling therapy with parents, with occupational therapy with parent and child together.

Terrain NRM

This project, in partnership between Terrain NRM, a not-for-profit working in the Wet Tropics to promote sustainable use of land and waterways, and GreenCollar, a leading environmental markets developer, will support landholders to improve water quality and health of the Great Barrier Reef though Reef Credits, the first reef water quality environmental market in Australia. Reef Credits place a monetary value on water quality improvements to drive on-ground action. This new approach is designed to engage a new source of reef investment, providing farmers with greater surety, and ability to plan for long-term improvements. The NAB Foundation's seed grant will enable the employment of a Reef Credits Engagement Officer to accelerate community uptake.

The Nature Conservancy

The Nature Conservancy is a respected conservation organisation well known for developing commercial models to generate funding for conservation and restoring landscapes to underpin sustainable economic development. The Windara Reef Project, started in 2016, is rebuilding 20 hectares of lost oyster reefs (Australia’s most endangered marine ecosystem) in Gulf St Vincent, South Australia. The reef will improve local water quality, bolster and diversify the struggling aquaculture industry, sustain primary production, and create new regional jobs in science and technology, construction, fishing and tourism. The NAB Foundation's thrive grant will help complete construction of the reef, thereby providing a proven model for national reef restoration throughout Australia.

Two Good Co.

Two Good Co believe that every woman and child is worthy of love and respect. This is demonstrated by providing free, restaurant-quality meals to domestic violence safe houses across Sydney and Melbourne. Two Good Co is a buy-one, give-one social enterprise serving organic meals designed by some of Australia’s best chefs. For every Two Good Co meal purchased, one is delivered to a woman in a domestic violence shelter in Australia. They also employ women from the refuges they serve and provide them with culinary training with the aim of promoting self-worth. Since Two Good Co was launched in 2015, more than 20,000 meals have been delivered to people in need.

In 2017, the NAB Foundation supported Two Good Co by providing a seed grant to assist in building capacity through a new IT platform to automate online ordering processes and keep users informed of services available for domestic violence victims. Following a successful one-year partnership, the NAB Foundation extended the partnership to 2020 with operational support to build scale and sustainability.

University of Melbourne

The University of Melbourne strives to be a public-spirited institution, ranked among the finest universities in the world. It seeks to harness strength, breadth and depth of research to help meet global challenges and attract the brightest cohort from the widest range of backgrounds, offering an outstanding student experience. The University makes research, student learning and engagement serve public interests, this includes taking up pressing societal problems in research, producing graduates prepared for responsibility and promoting inquiry and open debate based on evidence and reason.

The NAB Foundation's seed grant is supporting the University of Melbourne to refine and test a world-first, evidence-based smartphone tool for men who have used violence in their intimate relationships. The tool, which is based on pilot work with men and health practitioners aims to intervene early by raising awareness of abusive behaviours and encouraging self-reflection and help-seeking before violence escalates.

Women's Information Referral Exchange (WIRE)

WIRE’s mission is to build a society in which women are safe, respected, valued, informed, empowered and free to make genuine choices. They are the only state-wide women’s service that provides information, referral and confidential support to all Victorian women regardless of the issues they face. They offer a range of training programs for women in an environment that is free of exploitation and discrimination. The organisation researches and advocates on issues impacting women including financial literacy and economic security, gender equity and violence against women.

The NAB Foundation's thrive grant supported the development of a national toolkit and online companion resource to educate and inform financial and community services providers. The toolkit aims to build capacity in the financial and community service sector by increasing sector knowledge around building women’s financial resilience, provide the necessary resources to the professionals working with women around financial decision making, create the buy-in to achieve individual and organisational behavioural change and enable women to access the support they need to improve their short, medium and long term financial security.

Previous grant recipients

The NAB Foundation under its previous name, MLC Community Foundation, is proud to have supported the following organisations in the work they do supporting and solving mental health.

2016	Black Dog Institute Smiling Mind Garvan Institute of Medical Research Rural and Remote Mental Health Top Blokes Foundation STREAT
2008 - 2016	Lifeline Australia
2004 - 2015	Garvan Research Foundation
2015	Suicide Prevention Australia R U OK? Foundation
2013 - 2014	Suicide Prevention Australia Inspire Foundation RU OK? Foundation MadCap Café
2012 - 2013	Big Brothers Big Sisters of Australia CanTeen Inspire Foundation Jean Hailes for Women's Health
2011 - 2012	Big Brothers Big Sisters of Australia CanTeen Inspire Foundation Jean Hailes Foundation for Women's Health St Vincent de Paul's Society Lantern YMCA Sydney
2010 - 2011	Black Dog Institute Mind Australia YMCA Sydney Lantern Stillbirth Foundation Camp Quality
2009 - 2010	Black Dog Institute Mind Australia YMCA Sydney Youth Focus
2008 - 2009	Affirm- Australian Foundation for Mental Health Research SANE Australia StepUP Foundation

About our investment approach

Beyond our grant making program, we also engage in impact investment as one way of unlocking additional capital from the Trust to help solve social problems and thereby increase our impact. We look for impact investment opportunities that deliver either a financial return and / or positive social outcome. The impact investment market is an evolving one and we believe this is an innovative way to support financially sustainable initiatives that address social issues.

To date, the NAB Foundation demonstrated the strategic role of philanthropy by enabling an Australian-first social finance transaction to use philanthropic guarantees. The transaction enabled Sacred Heart Mission to expand its 'Journey To Social Inclusion Program' (J2SI). Find out more about this innovative program to provide better outcomes for people experiencing long-term homelessness here.

Overtime, we plan to invest our underlying assets with a clearly articulated socially responsible investment position.

Governance and management

The NAB Foundation is a Private Charitable Trust established in 2008 under its previous name, MLC Community Foundation. Changing to the NAB Foundation in 2016 reflects the whole of the NAB Group’s support of the Foundation and we continue the legacy of providing vital funding, awareness and advocacy support to social purpose organisations.

The NAB Foundation is governed by Australian Executor Trustees Limited. The Foundation’s management team - Lucy Doyle and Claire Elliott, are part of NAB’s Corporate Responsibility team and are accountable to the Trustee for delivering on all operational matters and execution of strategies and programs.

History

The NAB Foundation began as part of the MLC business, which has a long standing and established commitment to supporting the communities in which their people live and work. From 2000 to 2008, MLC's People and Community Trust (known as Pact) supported programs and initiatives that were designed to make a lasting difference to the community. This was achieved by providing opportunities for their employees to be involved in, to enrich both their lives and the lives of others.

The name 'Pact' signified the commitment that was made between employees, MLC and the community and a charter was developed that had input by a cross section of employees.

In September 2008, the MLC Community Foundation was established as a Private Charitable Trust overseen by a Trustee and registered with the Australian Taxation Office. This marked a real commitment to securing a long term, sustainable pool of funds with which to support the community. Just as MLC Community Foundation's name was chosen to represent and acknowledge the heritage of MLC, the transition to NAB Foundation in 2016 is a reflection of the whole organisation’s support behind the foundation.

Today, as a part of NAB’s broader social impact approach, we look to support the community organisations we work with beyond financial grants by drawing on the skills, expertise and resources from across the NAB Group. This is another important way we continue to reflect the foundation’s origins of employee engagement in the community.

NAB Foundation, ABN: 27 308 230 413

Insights and research

We support customers and community groups by sharing our market insights, research and thought leadership through the NAB Charitable Giving Index.

Workplace giving

We actively encourage our people to volunteer, make donations and become involved in their community.

Indigenous Australian support

We're proud to support and celebrate Indigenous success. As part of our Reconciliation Action Plan, we’re helping create opportunities and real outcomes for Indigenous Australians.

Impact measurement

We measure the value we’re returning to the community so we can make the most of our investment.

Latest offers

NAB Foundation and grants

A few key results

$12.6m

14 strategic partners

Partnered with

Want to get in contact with the NAB Foundation?

The NAB Foundation is not currently seeking applications and we do not take unsolicited proposals for funding.

Why is this important?

About our grant focus

About our current partners

Australian Land Conservation Alliance (ALCA)

Australian Wildlife Conservancy

Infoxchange

Odonata

Our Watch

Reef Restoration Foundation

Sacred Heart Mission

StartSomeGood

Sydney Children's Hospitals Foundation

Terrain NRM

The Nature Conservancy

Two Good Co.

University of Melbourne

Women's Information Referral Exchange (WIRE)

Previous grant recipients

About our investment approach

Governance and management

History

Discover more

Insights and research

Workplace giving

Indigenous Australian support

Impact measurement

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NAB Foundation and grants

Article tags

A few key results

$12.6m

14 strategic partners

Partnered with

Want to get in contact with the NAB Foundation?

The NAB Foundation is not currently seeking applications and we do not take unsolicited proposals for funding.

Why is this important?

About our grant focus

About our current partners

Australian Land Conservation Alliance (ALCA)

Australian Wildlife Conservancy

Infoxchange

Odonata

Our Watch

Reef Restoration Foundation

Sacred Heart Mission

StartSomeGood

Sydney Children's Hospitals Foundation

Terrain NRM

The Nature Conservancy

Two Good Co.

University of Melbourne

Women's Information Referral Exchange (WIRE)

Previous grant recipients

About our investment approach

Governance and management

History

Discover more

Insights and research

Workplace giving

Indigenous Australian support

Impact measurement