**Some programs are limited. Please read solicitations carefully and consult your Office of Research for specifics, such as limited applications through your university and internal application deadlines.**

Freshwater Storytelling: Request for Proposals | April 22, 2025

Access to Safe and Clean Water is crucial to human development. Sustainable Development Goal #6 captures the essence of water by committing to making safe and affordable drinking water available for all by the year 2030. Despite this, many parts of the world are currently having significant challenges with access to safe water. Issues like climate change, and the way that we live, are putting unsustainable demands on the global supply of freshwater. In essence, we are using more freshwater than we can regenerate, and this has led to approximately 10% of the world’s population currently lacking access to clean and fresh water.

The National Geographic Society’s World Freshwater Initiative seeks to illuminate the status of freshwater supplies and demands globally by highlighting areas of water shortage, assessing human use of water on local and regional ecosystems and exploring the impact of climate change on water provinces around the world. The World Freshwater Initiative has two key components that help us accomplish this:

  • The World Water Map, a powerful geo-visualization of water availability globally. It promotes water literacy, informs audiences of freshwater issues at the global and hyper-local level, and helps answer important questions such as: where are the world’s “water gaps,” where human demand for freshwater outpaces the renewable supply? What sectors are driving this demand?
  • Grantmaking in the areas of storytelling, conservation and education. Through these grants, we’re cultivating a community of Explorers who are inspiring actions that promote sustainable water use.

In partnership with the Conrad Hilton Foundation’s Safe Water Initiative, The National Geographic Society seeks submissions from storytellers interested in creating and disseminating content that raises public awareness and engagement of important issues around the sustainable use of freshwater resources.

Applicants may request between US$20,000 (Level I) to US$100,000 (Level II) per grant. We do, however, encourage storytellers who are early in their careers (5 years or less experience) to apply at the US$20,000 level.

Application Deadline: April 22, 2025 at 11:59 PM US-EDT

Announcement: https://www.nationalgeographic.org/society/grants-and-investments/rfp-freshwater/