Courage
in Action
Highlights
Annual Report
2025
2025 felt like quicksand. In this fast paced and difficult year, every attempt to move seemed to make the ground rearrange itself.
When the world feels unstable, there is a tendency to retreat into private survival strategies and this year offered plenty of incentives for that retreat. And yet, as we listened to partners, what emerged was that the opposite was happening. Movements adapted creatively. They shared risk in solidarity. They took to the streets. On the evidence of an entire year, we saw real courage in action.
A glimpse of the work of our grantee-partners
Haiti
Fund for Haitian Women
In Haiti, the Fund for Haitian Women launched and made its first grants in 2025. With Solidarity Fund support, the fund invested in core systems and infrastructure including grantmaking software and monitoring and evaluation tools, supporting its transition from launch toward first grant distributions.
Europe
Trans Network Balkans
In Europe and Central Asia, Trans Network Balkans reorganised its organisational presence across EU and non-EU countries. This strategic move expanded access to regional funding and enabled resources to flow more effectively to trans-led initiatives working under legal and political pressure.
Nigeria
Intersex Nigeria
In Nigeria, Intersex Nigeria used long-term support to build sustained engagement with public health institutions. Its collaboration with the Federal Ministry of Health created entry points for addressing harmful medical practices and discrimination against intersex people at a national level.
Indonesia
Jakarta Feminist
In Indonesia, Jakarta Feminist’s continued documentation of femicide helped shift public and media attention toward sexual and gender-based violence as a systemic issue. Through consistent reporting and advocacy, the group helped make femicide a prominent issue in protests and public discussions.
The Netherlands and Aruba, Bonaire, Curaçao, Saba, Sint Eustatius and Sint Maarten (the ABCSSS islands)
Hopeful Migrant Lesbian Women (SAUTI)
Hopeful Migrant Lesbian Women (SAUTI) is a small collective of lesbian and bisexual migrant women, including women living in asylum-seeking centres. With Spark Fund support, the group covered transport so women could gather monthly. They used cooking and shared meals as a method for peer support while also creating space to navigate the layered pressures of stress, trauma, isolation, and the invasive questions women may face during immigration interviews about their sexuality.
Costa Rica
Cuerpxs que Trazan
Other Revolution Fund grants supported cultural and narrative strategies as tools of political intervention. In Costa Rica, Cuerpxs que Trazan used its Revolution grant to convene the Desobediencia Centraka artistic residency, bringing together trans, non-binary, and sexual and gender diverse artists from across Central America. The residency created space for embodied political work around migration, memory, pleasure, and resistance, producing shared documentation and strengthening regional networks.
Critical work continues
In 2025, women’s and feminist funds played a key role in maintaining stability in a rapidly changing funding landscape.
In times of backlash, when other funding is withdrawn or restricted, women’s and feminist funds stay. They don’t back down or pack up when funding is withdrawn or cut. They hold critical lines of support that keep movements alive, helping prevent hard-won rights from being rolled back and ensuring people navigating backlash don’t lose essential support.
Feministas en Holanda, Spark grantee-partner:
‘The support from Mama Cash has been fundamental to ensuring the continuity and depth of our actions; without it, our initiatives simply would not have been possible. In a global context of increasing gender backlash and fascism, the ability to hold spaces for encounter and collective building is not only a strategy, but also a necessity for survival.’
Ashrafun Nahar Misti, Women with Disabilities Development Foundation, Bangladesh, grantee-partner Resilience Fund:
‘We are deeply grateful to Mama Cash for inspiring us, motivating us, and giving us the strength to continue our work with determination. We will carry forward our mission with the same dedication and spirit. Long live Mama Cash!’
Anonymous, Spark grantee-partner:
‘In 2025, we also strongly felt the impact of political changes. Thanks to Mama Cash, however, we were able to continue our activities despite these setbacks. Your support has also enabled us to ensure accessibility (as much as possible) and to have more resources to work collaboratively, as well as on communication, coordination, and facilitation of activities.’
A member of Hopeful Migrant Lesbian Women (SAUTI), Spark grantee-partner:
‘Before joining Hopeful Migrant Lesbian Women meetings, I felt completely lonely and out of place. I came to the Netherlands alone after escaping gangs in my country. I now feel at home, free and I can openly speak to someone who really cares to listen and support me emotionally and sometimes financially.”
What women’s and feminist funds achieved in 2025 with our support
100%
have a system of shared leadership and/or decision-making in place
82%
built or strengthened holistic security approaches
94%
built or strengthened (in)formal alliances in movements
82%
accessed, created, and/or defended space for feminist demands and influence
65%
contributed to changes in access and control over resources
94%
contributed to shifts in social, political, and cultural norms
Our 2025 grantmaking
Resilience Fund
18
New grants
Number of grants
184
Total amount granted
€6029680
Average amount per grant
€32770
Revolution Fund
10
New grants
Number of grants
10
Total amount granted
€92000
Average amount per grant
€9200
Radical Love Fund
8
New grants
Number of grants
8
Total amount granted
€56000
Average amount per grant
€7000
Spark Fund
12
New grants
Number of grants
28
Total amount granted
€152500
Average amount per grant
€5446
Solidarity Fund
8
New grants
Number of grants
15
Total amount granted
€450000
Average amount per grant
€30000
“In our own work which seeks to empower workers and advance labour rights, we are proud to partner with Mama Cash as an intermediary to support trust-based, participatory, and accompaniment practices in philanthropy.”
– Ryan Heman, Director, Forced Labor & Human Trafficking, Humanity United
