Macquarie Group Foundation 2022 Annual Review
Chair's message
Welcome to the Macquarie Group Foundation 2022 Annual Review, which highlights the work we do to support the communities in which we live and work. This year marks our 37th year and my first year as Chair.
The Foundation achieved a significant milestone in FY2022 – with more than half a billion Australian dollars ($A520 million) contributed since our inception in 1985. We’ve achieved this milestone thanks to the donations and fundraising efforts of our staff, together with Foundation matching and our grant making program. We are proud to reach this point in our charitable giving and within the 2022 Review, reflect on the contribution this funding has made to the communities in which we live and work.
Alex Harvey
Chief Financial Officer,
Financial Management Group (Sydney)
Leigh Harrison
Head of Real Assets,
Macquarie Asset Management (London)
Verena Lim
CEO Asia (Singapore)
Find out how we’re supporting our grant partners and empowering our staff to give back to their communities for greater impact.
Focusing on the communities where Macquarie people live and work enables a better understanding of local needs and helps to leverage employee time, expertise, and networks for greater impact. In FY2022, our people continued to volunteer their time in a variety of ways, including pro bono service and leading on non-profit organisation boards. Many employees provide their time and skills to non-profit organisations supporting social and economic mobility of young people, aligned with the Foundation’s global grant-making focus.
Virtual volunteering remained active throughout FY2022, with Macquarie people continuing to be highly engaged in global initiatives such as Foundation Week, as well as regional initiatives including Mentoring Week in the Americas, Raise Foundation mentoring in ANZ, Better Migration Week in Asia, and Social Mobility Week in EMEA.
In October, the eighth annual Foundation Week contributed $A2.7 million to 175 non-profits, with more than 212 fundraising and volunteering events held across 44 offices. By hosting 87 per cent of Foundation Week fundraising and volunteer events either virtually or in a hybrid way,5 Macquarie people ensured the non-profit organisations they were passionate about still received support despite the ongoing pandemic.
non-profits supported
contributed in FY22
offices participated
fundraising and volunteering events
The majority of the Foundation’s grant funding is directed to organisations supporting social and economic opportunities for people in the communities where we live and operate, with each region concentrating its efforts on issues with local relevance.
Each of our four regions – the Americas, Asia, Australia and Europe, the Middle East and Africa (EMEA) face distinct challenges and priorities, which is why, using an evidence-based approach to inform our grant making focus areas, we have selected the following regional approaches to create the greatest social impact:
In Australia, we support young people to participate in jobs that prepare them for a better future.
In the Americas, we support organisations promoting college access, success and career attainment for underrepresented youth.
In Asia, we support organisations enabling access to decent work opportunities for migrant workers, so they can achieve better migration outcomes.
In EMEA, we support people (16-80yrs+) to achieve their social mobility aspirations through employment, with an emphasis on enduring jobs and meaningful work.
Below is a snapshot of where our grant partners are having impact around the world6:
In support of communities and families across Ukraine, our people and the Foundation have donated a total of $A3.5 million7 to organisations working to provide vital humanitarian support. Recipients included International Medical Corps and Razom.
The Macquarie Racial Equity Fund (REF) was established in 2020 in the Americas to support solutions that promote a more equitable and just society for all people. In FY2021 and FY2022, $US1 million from the REF was allocated across eight organisations supporting one-off and multi-year projects, including Black Girls Code, the Thurgood Marshall Scholarship Fund, and YWCA’s WE360 project supporting entrepreneurs of colour. In FY2022 Macquarie expanded the REF to $US5 million over five years to support direct relief programs, research, policy, education, and economic equity initiatives.
In FY2022, the Foundation fully deployed the COVID-19 donation fund, with grants made in FY2021 and FY2022 to 408 organisations in 329 countries across three focus areas:
In 2019, Macquarie announced five winners of the Macquarie 50th Anniversary Award to each receive $A10 million over a five‑year period for bold, social impact projects: Last Mile Health, Monash University’s World Mosquito Program, Murdoch Children’s Research Institute’s World Scabies Program, Social Finance and The Ocean Cleanup. Throughout FY2022, the five winners continued to make significant progress against social and environmental issues while adapting to pandemic challenges.
Our vision is to increase the social impact we are driving with our staff and the business to innovate and invest for a better future. We are doing this in two key intersecting ways; by increasing catalytic capital and shared value, while continuing to increase staff engagement with the Foundation’s core programs.
The catalytic capital pillar of our strategy aims to increase the scale and impact of our community investments focused on increasing social and economic mobility. Through both impact investing and grant making, the Foundation aims to unlock social impact and additional investment that would not otherwise be possible.
The Foundation is working to become a more equitable grant maker. In FY2022 we worked with external diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) experts Third Settlements who provided philanthropy specific DEI training to the Foundation team and Committee and reviewed our current grant making processes and practices. Based on Third Settlements' recommendations, the Foundation will be making changes to our grant making design, processes and decision making so they are more inclusive and equitable and take account of the diversity of the communities we support.
To expand the scope and scale of the Foundation’s impact, in FY2022 a one-time $A20 million allocation was made to the Foundation to expand our social impact investments program over the coming years. This activity aims to generate positive, measurable social returns, with any financial returns returned to the Foundation to generate additional social impact. The allocation builds on the Foundation’s $A1 million social impact investing pilot, as well as over 10 years of wider sector support.
The shared value pillar of our strategy is about supporting our businesses to think about solving social problems through their business models. We are discovering opportunities to drive more shared value at Macquarie and uncovering the many ways our businesses are already innovating in this area. We are now focusing on how the Foundation can help catalyse more of this social impact driven through our businesses.
In FY2022, Macquarie and Generation UK launched a pioneering green jobs program. The initiative is the first of its kind offering profession-specific training to people facing barriers into employment to help them enter the green sector. The program has been developed with guidance from experts across Macquarie, the Foundation and Green Investment Group (GIG), with catalytic funding provided by the Foundation. Twelve10 learners have completed the course and are accredited.
For over 20 years, Macquarie Sports has been providing sporting opportunities to children in communities around Australia in the belief that they can be inspired and motivated by interacting with sporting role models.
Macquarie Sports also provides grants to sporting organisations that run programs supporting young people who face barriers to opportunity, and corporate scholarships to elite young sports people, enabling their transition to the workforce.
This year, we celebrate our achievements and reflect on the year that’s passed.
The Macquarie Group Collection (the Collection) has been supporting emerging Australian artists for over 30 years by acquiring and displaying their works in Macquarie offices around the world.
The Collection features art in all media, around the theme The Land and Its Psyche, reflecting the diversity of the Australian landscape as seen through the eyes of its artists.
Now comprising more than 950 works selected by a volunteer committee of Macquarie employees and a curatorial expert, the Collection is on display in around 41 Macquarie offices worldwide.
This year, we celebrate the new contributions to our growing collection and reflect on the year that has passed.
Vanishing Point, 2019 by Aaron Rees,
2022 Macquarie Group Emerging Artist Prize Winner
Our annual reviews highlight the key financial, volunteering and pro bono support Macquarie and staff contribute around the world each year.
