NGT Foundation

The establishment of the Nature Glenelg Trust (NGT) Foundation in 2018 was a significant milestone for our organisation.

The NGT Foundation is an endowment fund, which has a long-term goal of generating a reliable, stable source of income to ensure the financial sustainability of NGT.

Among other things, this will allow us to help fund the effective management of the growing number of NGT Reserves:

- Eaglehawk Waterhole – South Australia (2013, expanded in 2022)
- Mt Burr Swamp – South Australia (2016, expanded in 2018)
- Kurrawonga – Victoria (2018)
- Walker Swamp – Victoria (2018, expanded in 2023)
- Long Point – Victoria (2018)
- Hutt Bay Wetland – South Australia (2019)
- Green Swamp – Victoria (2020)
- Mount Vandyke – Victoria (2021)

Effective management isn’t just about paying the rates, fixing fences, maintaining tracks and controlling pests or weeds – as important and real as these ongoing costs are. It is also about activities like supporting research that informs our restoration work, undertaking surveys and monitoring, active recovery of threatened species, and helping to bring back the species we have lost. Our reserves are all strategically located and ideally placed to be at the fore-front of restoration science and practice in south-eastern Australia over the decades ahead.

How it works

The NGT Foundation is a capital fund established to provide a long-term income stream to ensure the financial sustainability of NGT.

To achieve this goal, all contributions into the NGT Foundation will be preserved and invested ethically.

At the appropriate time in the future, when the preserved capital balance has grown to a sufficient level, the investment earnings will be judiciously used by NGT to support our work.

Based on the past performance of long-term investments, we aim to ensure that every $20 donated, will eventually result in a sustainable income stream of $1 per year, in perpetuity.

NGT’s investment management partnership with the ACF

By 2021, the NGT Foundation grew to an extent that required us (under the terms of our Investment Policy Statement) to seek an investment partner/manager. After investigating a range of options, Nature Glenelg Trust eventually entered into a Memorandum of Understanding with the Australian Communities Foundation (ACF), who we have nominated to be our investment management partner.

Under the terms of the MoU, NGT Foundation funds are invested as a Future Fund* with the ACF. The ACF is an excellent natural partner for NGT given our alignment of core values and shared ethical investment philosophy.

[*A Future Fund with the ACF enables not-for-profit organisations, looking to secure their longevity, to build an endowment, providing long-term sustainability and greater independence from external funding sources. Income from a Future Fund is granted back to the organisation as required in the future.]

How to become involved

The NGT Foundation accepts donations of all sizes, and also enables the creation of named sub-funds for major supporters.

Donate to the NGT Foundation Today

If you would like to establish a Named Fund, to appropriately recognise your role in helping to secure the long term future of Nature Glenelg Trust, or to honour the memory of someone special, please get in touch.

A Named Fund requires a minimum starting contribution of $10,000, noting that from 1st July 2022, this will increase to $20,000 in line with the requirements of ACF, our investment management partner.

All donations over $2 are fully tax-deductible.

Ask about setting up a Named Fund