India philanthropists showing more climate interest as US ‘lost sight’, says Rockefeller president

India’s philanthropists are showing a ‘little bit more climate interest’, according to Rockefeller Foundation president Rajiv J Shah. 

‘Our projects are getting a lot of co-financing from local philanthropy partners. Globally, the amount of giving to climate related impacts is minuscule,’ he told Forbes India.  

Shah described US giving to climate-related causes as ‘terribly low’, claiming the US has ‘lost sight’.  

‘We started talking about climate in degrees and temperature or every conceptual language. We didn’t talk about it as these are rural women who are improving their actual lives so that they can go home to their families and have more dignity and empowerment. That connection back to improving people’s lives in the most practical and understandable way got lost in climate action,’ he said.  

The Rockefeller chief also raised concerns about the large amount of philanthropic capital swirling around in the US, but the majority going towards universities and colleges.  

‘A small fraction, maybe 25 percent goes to social impact and an even smaller amount, in single digits, goes to climate,’ he said. 

Shah told Forbes India that women should be the ‘focus’ for the green energy transition.  

‘We know from all of development economics, when you increase labour productivity of women, when you increase their incomes, you start this positive cycle of kids going to better schools, more educational attainment and more generational opportunity get realised. Whereas the same dollar of additional income going to men has a far less direct impact on community development outcomes,’ he said.  

Meanwhile, both Rockefeller and the UK’s Wellcome Trust announced two new integrated initiatives to protect South Asians from extreme heat. 

Alongside World Health Organisation (WHO), the World Meteorological Organisation (WMO) and the Climate and Health Joint Programme, the philanthropies launched a ‘South Asia Climate-Health Desk’ to help improve how ways to bring climate and weather information into action.  

A Rockefeller grant also goes towards the South Asia Scientific Research Consortium, deepening the region’s scientific understanding of how heat affects different populations. 

In 2024 alone, heat exposure in India led to 247 billion potential work hours lost and an estimated $194 billion loss in income, according to the Lancet Countdown, a platform that tracks progress on global health and the climate crisis. 

Shafi Musaddique is the news editor at Alliance magazine