Over the past year, Kore Global has had the privilege of leading the external evaluation of the Ford Foundation’s Gender, Racial, and Ethnic Justice – International (GREJ-I) strategy (2020–2024). The GREJ-I programme focuses on preventing gender-based violence (GBV) by supporting organisations — especially those led by and serving women, girls, LGBTQI+ and gender-diverse people in the Global South — to build transformative, sustainable solutions to end violence.

We used a feminist action evaluation approach, guided by principles of participation, intersectionality, and wellbeing. We listened to 55 grantee partners and 23 external stakeholders across Africa, Asia, and Latin America through in-depth conversations, and we synthesised their insights in participatory sense-making workshops. These collective spaces ensured the evaluation was grounded in lived realities and shaped by those closest to the work.

As the world marks the 16 Days of Activism against GBV, the stories coming from those leading prevention efforts are stories of resilience in the face of shrinking civic space and unprecedented uncertainty. Across regions — from West and Southern Africa to India and Latin America — feminist and community-based organisations are working tirelessly to sustain movements, deepen prevention efforts, and reimagine gender justice.

This blog lifts up what we heard — the realities, the resilience, and the lessons — and calls on funders to meet the moment. They are reaching deeper into grassroots movements, channeling flexible resources through strengthened feminist funding mechanisms.

1. The GBV prevention ecosystem is under immense strain

Across regions, organisations described a global convergence of pressures: reductions in donor spending, polarisation, and escalating challenges. Momentum that had been building around shared agendas for GBV prevention up until early 2024 has stalled, as many organisations have been forced to turn inward simply to cope with the current climate.

This fragility is exacerbated by chronic underfunding. Less than 0.2% of global ODA is directed to GBV prevention efforts (Equality Institute & the Accelerator for GBV Prevention, 2023),  whilst resources continue to flow overwhelmingly to Global North institutions, leaving feminist movements and grassroots organisations in the Global South severely under-resourced (Weave Collective, 2024). Recent funding withdrawals have cut billions from gender equality efforts, directly affecting GREJ-I grantees and threatening the sustainability of long-standing feminist organising.

Women’s rights organisations — those with the least resources yet doing the most essential prevention work — are being hit the hardest. This goes to the heart of the GREJ-I programme’s underlying premise: sustainable progress on GBV prevention is only possible when feminist movements are strong, well-resourced, and able to lead.  They are reaching deeper into grassroots movements, channeling flexible resources through strengthened feminist funding mechanisms.

2. Despite these headwinds, feminist movements sustain progress — when trusted and resourced

Even in a difficult environment, GREJ-I partners have shown what is possible with flexible, long-term support.

• They have strengthened leadership, governance, and staff wellbeing, building resilience that allows them to stay focused on prevention.
• They are shifting harmful norms through trusted relationships with traditional leaders, youth groups, and community networks.
• They are improving institutional responses, from supporting the implementation of South Africa’s GBVF National Strategic Plan to shaping gender-sensitive urban planning in India.
• They are advancing evidence through intersectional research and practice-based learning, expanding the field’s understanding of what effective prevention looks like.
• They are reaching deeper into grassroots movements, channeling flexible resources through strengthened feminist funding mechanisms.

3. But progress will not hold without urgent, long-term investment in prevention and movement infrastructure

Partners were clear that several systemic gaps threaten the future of GBV prevention efforts:

• Prevention remains small-scale and fragmented. Most efforts operate in pilots or isolated pockets, without long-term funding for scale.
• Technical capacity gaps persist. Even with strong tools and frameworks, many organisations need prevention-specific training and accompaniment — a need heightened by recent funding cuts.
• Data and evidence systems are weakening. Cuts to population-level surveys are creating a looming evidence crisis. Without reliable data, governments cannot track or plan for progress.
• Policy implementation is under-resourced. Policies often lack the budgets, staffing, and monitoring systems required for sustained impact.

Addressing these gaps will require coordinated action, strengthened partnerships, new sources of funding, and new imaginings of what long-term, community-rooted prevention can look like.They are reaching deeper into grassroots movements, channeling flexible resources through strengthened feminist funding mechanisms.

4.  A call to funders: This is the moment to show up differently

One message came through clearly from the evaluation: the GBV prevention field needs long-term, flexible, feminist-aligned funding. 

Funders such as the Ford Foundation now have an important opportunity to address the identified challenges through the following actions: 

• Support long-term core funding (ideally 5–10 year cycles): Sustained core support gives organisations the stability they need to plan, retain staff, and build strong, resilient institutions. Multi-year cycles of at least five years — and ideally 5–10 years — align far better with the realities of shifting norms, strengthening systems, and building community trust. Long-term, flexible support helps organisations weather uncertainty and remain focused on prevention, not just survival.
• Invest in prevention for the long haul. GBV prevention takes time. It requires trusted relationships, skilled facilitators, consistent community engagement, and the ability to adapt approaches as learning emerges. Short-term grants simply cannot support this. Dedicated, multi-year prevention funding enables organisations to move beyond pilots and deliver interventions at the scale needed to create population-level change.
• Strengthen data and evidence infrastructure. Reliable data is essential for tracking progress, understanding risk patterns, and making the case for sustained investment. Yet cuts to population-level surveys and prevalence studies are creating a serious evidence gap. Supporting national data systems, locally-led research, and practice-based learning platforms will be vital to ensuring that prevention work is grounded in credible, up-to-date evidence.
• Resource multi-sectoral approaches: GBV prevention requires coordinated action across health, education, justice, social protection, and economic systems — but funding often sits in siloes. A small shift in donor practice could make a transformative difference. For example, if donors consistently earmarked just 0.1% of health and education budgets for GBV prevention, it could radically expand the global funding pool (Equality Institute & the Accelerator for GBV Prevention, 2023). 
• Create and protect collective learning and support spaces: Across regions, partners emphasised the need for spaces to come together, share insights, navigate political headwinds, and learn from one another. These spaces are especially important now, as organisations grapple with uncertainty and rapid shifts in the landscape. Resourcing convenings, accompaniment models, and regional learning platforms help strengthen the wider ecosystem and ensure organisations are not facing these pressures alone.

We want to thank the GREJ-I team and the Ford Foundation for partnering with us on this evaluation, and to express our deep appreciation to GREJ-I grantees and partners who generously shared their insights and experience. During these 16 Days of Activism, we honour their leadership and resilience. Their work continues to show what is possible when feminist movements are trusted and supported, and we remain committed to walking alongside them in the effort to prevent GBV and advance gender, racial, and ethnic justice.

Find out more about the project here and read the summary of the evaluation findings here.