The Prince Albert II of Monaco Foundation presented its 2025 impact report presentation on Thursday 19th March at Marius, giving donors and partners a glimpse of what lies ahead.
In his speech, Romain Ciarlet, Vice Chairman and CEO of the Prince Albert II of Monaco Foundation, was careful to make one thing clear. “We raised these funds from investors, not donors — I want to specify that. It’s very important.”
He was talking about the ReOcean Fund, the Foundation’s impact investment vehicle, which targets companies delivering measurable benefits to ocean health. It has raised €75 million against a €100 million target and will complete four new investments totalling roughly €20 million in 2026. It is, by any measure, a significant departure from the grant-making that has defined environmental philanthropy for decades.
The reason for the shift is that young companies with credible solutions struggle to access the capital they need to scale, and donors alone cannot fill that gap. So the Foundation has positioned itself as a bridge, using its networks and credibility to bring commercial investors into territory they might otherwise avoid.
And this approach is already producing results. One recent investment is in Bound4Blue, a Spanish firm founded by aerospace engineers, whose rigid suction sails can reduce fuel consumption on commercial vessels by 15 to 20 per cent. Another is in NatureMetrics, a British company that uses environmental DNA to measure biodiversity, a tool increasingly in demand as corporate biodiversity reporting requirements tighten.
Turning talks into commitments
The Foundation’s initiatives have also translated into hard commitments, with the most convincing example being the Blue Economy and Finance Forum, which it hosted ahead of last year’s United Nations Ocean Conference. The Forum mobilised €8.7 billion in new pledges toward 2030 ocean goals. A second edition now takes place on 28th and 29th May 2026. “These were not just talks,” Ciarlet said. “There were commitments.”
Funding the people who live in nature
However, investment is only one part of the equation for the Foundation. On the other end of the scale sits work that supports people that actually bear the consequences.
In Pakistan’s Indus Delta, home to one of the world’s largest mangrove ecosystems, the Foundation supported a project run by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) that Ciarlet described as emblematic of the Foundation’s vision.
“It led to the creation of two marine protected areas, the restoration of nearly seven thousand hectares of degraded mangrove ecosystems, and it really empowered communities,” he said. “Mangroves absorb carbon and restore biodiversity — it’s common sense.” Thousands of local people were trained and helped to build livelihoods that work with nature rather than against it.
Backing Indigenous communities directly
That model – funding communities directly, bypassing international intermediaries – runs through most of the Foundation’s land-based work.
In 2026, three Indigenous-led organisations will begin on-the-ground implementation of forest protection projects in the Amazon Basin, the Congo Basin and South-East Asia, following a competitive selection process that drew over 80 applicants. “We do everything to empower local communities, and especially Indigenous communities around the globe,” Ciarlet said.
Studies suggest that 91 per cent of land managed by Indigenous communities is in good or fair ecological condition. Protecting forests through the people who actually live in them, the Foundation argues, is simply more effective than the alternative.
Also in 2026
Other initiatives include the Global Fund for Coral Reefs, co-founded by the Foundation in 2020, which will distribute an estimated €12 million across programmes in seven countries in a second funding round.
Meanwhile, The Donors’ Initiative for Mediterranean Freshwater Ecosystems (DIMFE) will hold its first ever Forum in Croatia to mark its fifth anniversary.
The MedFund will continue expanding its support for Mediterranean marine protected areas, with €760,000 in new five-year funding approved for protected areas in Turkey, Croatia and Lebanon.
And lastly, the Re.Generation programme will welcome a new class of young environmental leaders to Monaco from 22nd to 31st May.
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Main photo credit: Monaco Life
