Our Purpose
Established by Ann and Bart Becht in 2006, Becht Foundation is a UK-based global funder dedicated to protecting and restoring our planet’s biodiversity through marine conservation and climate communications. The ocean space is chronically underfunded, yet ocean ecosystems recover faster than land-based ones, making our ocean an untapped source of resilience against biodiversity loss and climate change. Becht Foundation supports marine conservation projects and campaigns to establish highly or fully protected marine protected areas, combat overfishing, and protect and restore marine and coastal ecosystems. Becht Foundation also supports data-driven communications campaigns aimed at changing the narrative on climate change and generating strong public support for climate action.
From the founders:"We have always believed we can and should live in full harmony with nature. Nature, even when not kind to us, is something to be nurtured, cherished and taken care of.
When we started our Foundation we were much less concerned about this than we were about the unneeded human suffering around the world. However, as time went by we became increasingly convinced that the way we are living and exploiting our planetary resources is very much damaging the world we live in, will certainly lead to increased suffering and possibly even the demise of mankind. As a consequence, we took a big step back and completely reassessed the purpose and direction of our Foundation in 2019, to focus on biodiversity through marine conservation and later included climate communications as an additional pillar. You will find the result of that review and the evolution of the Foundation in the following documents."
- Ann & Bart Becht
