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discussion / Funding and Finance  / 6 August 2025

How has the Funding & Finance group done?

Groups

The Funding and Finance group went live almost a year ago. We, that is the community members and group leaders, have ...

During this year, the group has steadily grown from 0 to 144 members, with which I am super happy, and people have found the group to ask their questions and make announcements, which as a group leader makes me even happier! It means that there is a clear interest in and visibility of the group! Thank you all for making that happen!

Aurélie, Henry and I are now preparing our plans for the coming year, and I would like to ask you how you experienced the Funding and Finance group?

  1.  Which activities did you like best?
  2. To which extend did you do follow and read the ...
     
    1. funding announcements,
    2. the introductory resources
    3. the questions?
  3. Do you have any general or specific remarks?

Please leave your answers in the comments. Or send me, Henry or Aurélie a message.

Your answers will mean a lot, because contrary to what you may assume in this world of click-bait and tracking, the WILDLABS server does not even provide us with total view counts on the individual posts and pages.  

 



Catherine Jardine
@CatherineJardine  | She/Her
Birds Canada Data Science and Technology Team. Primarily working on Motus and NatureCounts.
Inventory_key_contact

8 August 2025 5:47pm

Thank you for this amazing summary Frank! 

As someone regularly seeking conservation technology funding the posts on the resources page are very very helpful! I only just realized today that those are there and will now be checking back regularly. 

In terms of general feedback, it would be very useful to be able to subscribe to receive email notifications of new funding opportunities posted on the resources page. 

Thanks for all you do! 
 

Vance Russell
@VAR1
3point.xyz
Over 35 years of experience in biodiversity conservation worldwide, largely focused on forests, rewilding and conservation technology. I run my own business assisting nonprofits and agencies in the conservation community
Group Leader
Commenter level 2
Inventory Reviewer level 1

11 August 2025 6:21pm

Hi Frank,

First thanks to you, Henry, and Aurélie for making this group happen. It's much needed. This probably isn't that useful, but I find all three useful (announcements, resources, ?s). One big quest for me and others is, once you find the funding source that fits, how do you make the application easier to put together, e.g., are there parts of a proposal or application you can automate (not using AI to write, just automating the boring stuff)? Or could you utilize coding and AI to extract the necessary components from an RFP and structure the files and sections within them to then write and develop the budget? Super exciting stuff, but it gets tedious when you have a lot of proposals, each with their own slightly different requirements. 

There are some software solutions for this, but they're business oriented, expensive, and proprietary. This is really more funding solutions than funding but wondering if there's any interest in a team pursuing something that helps with this?

Best,

V