Introducing our Newest Charity Recommendations—From Reducing Brick Kiln Emissions to Securing Scale-up Funding for Alternative Proteins

By Ambitious Impact @ 2025-08-20T15:55 (+36)

Introducing our newest recommended ideas

We are excited to recommend six new impactful charities for the February 2026 cohort of the Charity Entrepreneurship Incubation Program. 

During the first half of 2025, we examined (i) climate interventions with co-benefits for human health or animal welfare and (ii) classic global health and development ideas that support humans' living longer and more fulfilling lives.

Our recommendations span different sectors and approaches, including a meta organization supporting local air quality monitoring and advocacy teams; training brick kiln owners in practices to reduce CO₂ and PM_2.5 emissions; innovative financing tools to assist smallholder farmers; a highly targeted Water, Sanitation, and Hygiene (WASH) mHealth intervention; advocating for supermarkets to make 60:40 plant:animal protein ratio commitments; and lobbying to secure scale-up funding for alternative proteins from governments. 

Below, you can find one-pager summaries of each recommendation and links to further details on our website. Full reports on each idea are available here. 

We are deeply appreciative of the people who supported us throughout this round, including dozens of experts who gave us their time and insight, and the group of AIM Research Program fellows who contributed to this research round: Léa Guttman, Margaret Hegwood, Maximilian Weylandt, Stuart Craig, and Unathi Maddie Beku. 

Note on ideal founder profile:

These summaries contain notes on the ideal founder profile. While we think candidates with the mentioned skills will have a comparative advantage/be especially promising for founding this idea, we still would like to encourage applicants from people who do not match this criteria but are enthusiastic about this idea and believe they may be well-suited for reasons not captured here

Strengthening air quality monitoring and advocacy in LMICs

Summary

• High-quality and transparent air-quality monitoring is a key enabler of reducing air pollution.
• While growing interest exists in expanding locally led air-quality monitoring and advocacy efforts, many local teams are undertrained and undersupported, limiting their effectiveness and chance of success.
• This charity will work to strengthen the global infrastructure of air quality monitoring & advocacy by providing services such as technical training, research support, monitoring & evaluation, community building, or facilitation of knowledge exchange.

The Problem

• What’s the problem?
  • The capacity to monitor air pollution is extremely limited in dozens of countries worldwide, many of which also have the highest air pollution levels.
• Why does it matter?
  • Air pollution is one of the most significant global risk factors for disease and disability, being responsible for nearly five million premature deaths per year.
  • The lack of high-quality, transparent, local data makes air pollution less “visible” to researchers, businesses, civil society organizations, and (crucially) policymakers, thus contributing to the topic’s neglectedness.
• Neglectedness:
  • While there is a growing interest among local actors in monitoring and addressing air pollution, the global infrastructure to support these local actors has been limited, and their progress has slowed down.

The Solution

• What’s the proposed solution?
  • This new charity will work to strengthen the global infrastructure of air quality monitoring & advocacy by providing services such as technical training, research support, monitoring & evaluation, community building, or facilitation of knowledge exchange.
• Why do we trust this solution?
  • There is rigorous observational evidence suggesting that the installation of air-quality monitors, paired with making their data publicly available, improves local air quality. There is also a growing number of case studies from various countries where local teams successfully used air-quality data to advocate for better regulations.
• How robust is the evidence?
  • The evidence that transparent air quality monitoring improves air quality is relatively weak, relying on one randomized controlled trial and one large-scale quasi-experimental study. However, it is supplemented by a range of case-study evidence. The evidence for the need for a new meta-charity relies primarily on expert opinions.

The Impact

• What impact could this have?
  • We estimate that, at scale, this charity could help avert around 12,000 DALYs and 24,000 tCO2 per year. However, given the nature of this charity idea, these estimates are highly uncertain.
• Estimated cost-effectiveness:
  • With very high uncertainty, we estimate that USD 35 per DALY and USD 18 per ton of CO2 will be avoided.

Ideal Founder Profile

• Who is best suited to do this?
  • This idea is suitable for strong generalists interested in tackling air pollution. At least one founder should have strong interpersonal skills and an interest in teaching/upskilling others. Experience with monitoring and evaluation (M&E) and/or with designing and evaluating interventions may be beneficial. Lastly, experience with air quality monitoring – especially source apportionment studies – would be extremely valuable, though we recognize this skill set is scarce. Alternatively, a strong technical background (in science or engineering) would be a good prerequisite for developing this expertise.

Reducing air pollution by improving brick kiln energy efficiency

Summary

• Artisanal brick kilns are a significant source of air pollution across South Asia, causing an estimated 60,000 premature deaths yearly.
• Many kilns in the region have been converted to cleaner ‘zigzag’ designs. However, the lack of proper training for workers means they cannot fully utilise the sustainability benefits of these conversions.
• Training the owners and operators of brick kilns is a cheap and effective way of reducing air pollution and GHGs, and it is currently highly neglected.
• If successful, this charity will be among the most cost-effective climate-oriented charities, at around USD 2 per ton of CO₂-equivalent averted.

The Problem

• What’s the problem?
  • Brick kilns—i.e., processing plants where bricks are burnt—constitute a significant source of air pollution and greenhouse gas emissions. This is especially true in South Asia, where low-tech artisanal brick kilns are widespread, typically burning coal as fuel.
  • In addition, they are significant emitters of greenhouse gases (GHGs), responsible for between 3 and 6% of carbon dioxide (CO₂) emissions in India and up to 10% in Bangladesh.
• Why does it matter?
  • Air pollution from brick kilns is estimated to be responsible for around 60,000 premature deaths annually in South Asia. As a significant emitter of GHGs, they also contribute to global warming.
• Neglectedness:
  • Governments in the region have tried to regulate the sector, but progress has so far been limited. The reasons for this are varied and include limited state capacity to enforce regulations and the fact that most brick kilns are informal businesses, making governments unwilling to invest money in them.
  • Other than a team scaling a training intervention in Bangladesh and West Bengal, India, we are unaware of any other major government or non-profit actors that focus on teaching brick kiln owners and operators energy-efficient practices.

The Solution

• What’s the proposed solution?
  • This charity will design and deliver targeted training for the owners and workers of brick kilns, teaching them a set of best practices that reduce the need for fuel and increase fuel burning efficiency, both of which result in lower emissions. While some of these practices are simple in theory – such as correct brick stacking and continuous fuel feeding—the training needs to be tailored to the needs of the local brick kiln industry and delivered in a culturally sensitive way for it to be adopted. A lack of this kind of adaptation has been a barrier to the success of some previous training attempts.
• Why do we trust this solution?
  • This idea primarily relies on one high-quality, large-scale randomized controlled trial (Brooks et al., 2025), which found a 20% emissions reduction among kilns that adopted the target practices. The intervention also increased kiln owners’ profits, which motivated its high uptake.
• How robust is the evidence?
  • The trial seemed to have been designed and delivered to a high standard. However, the 95% confidence interval of its effect-size estimates is quite wide (5.6%–34.2%), meaning the actual effect could be considerably smaller or greater than the headline result.

The Impact

• What impact could this have?
  • We estimate that if this charity reached 500 kilns per year, it would avert 1750 DALYs and 232,000 tons of CO₂-equivalent per year.
• Estimated cost-effectiveness:
  • USD 150–300/DALY
  • USD 1.60–4.70/ton of CO₂-equivalent

Ideal Founder Profile

• Who is best suited to do this?
  • While we believe that this charity can be co-founded by a strong generalist, there are several characteristics that could prove to be a major advantage: Having background in qualitative research (to be able to design a locally-tailored intervention), having background in engineering (to be able to understand the details of brick-making), and being from India (to be better able to form rapport with the kiln owners).
  • The founders will also need to be comfortable with the fact that brick kilns often involve work that violates human rights, such as forced work or child labor. While we don’t foresee a personal risk to the founders or a risk that this charity will make these violations counterfactually worse, the founders will have to have the ability to operate in an environment where such rights violations happen.

Increasing access to novel, low-risk loans for smallholder farmers

Summary

• This charity will work with existing financial institutions, such as savings cooperatives, to offer novel types of financial products, with a primary focus on asset-collateralized loans.
• To achieve this, the charity will provide these institutions with technical assistance, offer default insurance (to reduce the lenders’ risk), and help with the marketing of these loans to farmers to increase take-up.

The Problem

• What’s the problem?
  • Farmers often face barriers in accessing agricultural finance because they, for example, lack the required collateral, do not meet the strict eligibility criteria for loans, or cannot pay the high interest rate.
• Why does it matter?
  • A lack of access to finance prevents farmers from purchasing productive assets – such as water tanks, which can be used to store drinking water for cattle and in turn, increase the cattle’s milk production. An asset-collateralized loan, which would be repaid using the increased income from the water tank, can be used to overcome the upfront cost barrier.
• Neglectedness:
  • To our knowledge, no one is working on this idea outside of Kenya. Within Kenya, PxD is currently working with 5 savings cooperatives, but this intervention is not their core program.

The Solution

• What’s the proposed solution?
  • Instead of providing financial assistance, this charity aims to convince cooperatives and other institutions to offer farmers asset-collateralized loans for water tanks.
• Why do we trust this solution?
  • We primarily rely on one study from Kenya (n=1,804 farmers) demonstrating that asset-collateralized loans can increase milk sales, income, and consumption.
• How robust is the evidence?
  • This study is fairly old (the study period was over 10 years ago), and its results are only statistically significant when trimming the data (although we think that this analytical approach is justified). However, newer published and unpublished evidence supports the original study’s findings.

The Impact

• What impact could this have?
  • Assuming we can reach 30% of eligible farmers at scale in Kenya, we will create ~33,000 income doublings annually.
  • We do not anticipate negative effects on animal welfare. In fact, we expect welfare to potentially increase, as the affected animals will experience less thirst.
• Estimated cost-effectiveness:
  • We assume that, after providing an asset-collateralized loan, (discounted) milk sales will increase by 9%, increasing incomes by approximately 400 Kenyan Shillings (Ksh) per household per month. This intervention is expected to be cost-effective, creating 82 consumption doublings per USD 1,000, or costing USD 12 per consumption doubling.

Ideal Founder Profile

• Who is best suited to do this?
  • We think financial knowledge and advising experience would be a strong plus for at least one founder.
  • In addition, experience with or willingness to work in rural areas in LMICs would be valuable.

Reducing diarrhoeal-related deaths through targeted sanitation interventions

Summary

• A new team will target households at high risk of diarrhoeal disease through a simple, cost-effective package of WASH interventions. The process involves identifying hospitalized patients with diarrhoea, delivering a bedside education module, handing over low-cost WASH supplies (e.g., chlorine tablets), and following up via mobile messaging for up to a year after discharge.
• The theory of change (ToC) for this idea is clear and concise, with relatively simple core components and a low cost of necessary health commodities.
• We are encouraged by the significant and sustained effects observed in the RCTs for both WASH behaviour practices and diarrhoeal burden for up to 12 months.

The Problem

• What’s the problem?
  • Diarrhoeal diseases remain a major cause of preventable death in many countries across Sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia, particularly where poverty and poor healthcare access create barriers to prevention. The literature strongly suggests that household contacts of an index case of diarrhoea are at significantly higher risk of contracting diarrhoeal illness than the general population, making them a key group for intervention.
• Why does it matter?
  • Diarrhoeal-related mortality is almost entirely preventable. Proven WASH practices—such as handwashing with soap and using chlorine-treated water—are highly effective, low-cost prevention measures.
• Neglectedness:
  • While there is substantial ongoing work in the broader WASH space, this approach, using hospital case identification to deliver targeted, household-level interventions, is relatively novel. To date, it has mostly been tested in small-scale academic settings.

The Solution

• What’s the proposed solution?
  • A new charity will partner with hospitals to identify patients admitted with diarrhoeal illness and deliver targeted WASH interventions to households at high risk of contracting diarrhoeal illnesses. The intervention package will likely include bedside education, essential WASH supplies, and post-discharge follow-up via mobile messaging (SMS/IVR) or household visits. The charity will have to iterate through different combinations of these services to identify optimal combinations that maximize cost-effectiveness.
• Why do we trust this solution?
  • The idea was suggested to us by GiveWell as a potential area of research. While this targeted, hospital-linked approach is somewhat novel, it builds on a robust body of evidence supporting general WASH interventions, and we believe that salience for the adoption of WASH measures will be higher amongst households that have had a recent family member admitted to hospital for diarrhoeal illness.
• How robust is the evidence?
  • Variations of this intervention have been evaluated in high-quality field RCTs in Bangladesh and the DRC, demonstrating promising 12-month follow-up results in both improved adoption of WASH behaviors and reductions in diarrhoeal disease incidence and child stunting.

The Impact

• Estimated cost-effectiveness:
  • GiveWell has previously estimated this intervention to be between 5x and 13x relative to GiveDirectly. This range is influenced largely by geography and intervention design (i.e, the specific combination of services provided). We anticipate cost-effectiveness to be on the higher side of this range in the DRC. 

Ideal Founder Profile

• Who is best suited to do this?
  • It would be beneficial for the founding team to have experience in Monitoring, Evaluation, and Learning (MEL) and a healthcare or medical background.
  • Prior experience in designing messaging campaigns and an ability to manage complex partnerships with many stakeholders would also be of great benefit.
  • We think it is key that co-founders are comfortable with uncertainty and are committed to iteratively adapting the exact program of services provided based on MEL data.

Advocating for 60:40 plant:animal protein sales ratios by 2040

Summary

• The theory of change for this intervention is clear and concise.
  • It relies on collaborative corporate campaigning which is a well-tested and successful approach within the animal movement.
  • The charity will also provide technical assistance to supermarkets to help them meet their commitments.
• This intervention is expected to be extremely cost-effective, averting up to 177 SADs per 2023 USD (modeling a 60:40 plant:animal by 2040 commitment).
• We are encouraged by progress in the Netherlands where 13 supermarkets with a total market share greater than 90% have committed to 60:40 plant:animal protein sales ratios by 2030.

The Problem

• What’s the problem?
  • Supermarket protein ratios currently greatly favor animal proteins despite their negative climate and animal welfare impacts.
  • Many supermarkets have targets to reduce emissions in their value chain. They are unlikely to achieve this without addressing meat and dairy consumption, which makes up a significant portion of their environmental impact. We think that plant:animal protein ratio commitments are a win-win to help supermarkets meet these targets.
• Why does it matter?
  • Globally, food systems are responsible for major environmental impacts. Food systems account for 33% of anthropogenic greenhouse emissions, use 70% of the world's available fresh water, and use 50% of the world’s habitable land. Animal production is responsible for the majority (roughly 36 to 60%) of the food system's environmental impacts.
  • Animal production also results in the immense suffering of billions of farm animals annually. Roughly 85.44 billion land animals are slaughtered annually for meat and as many as 78 to 171 billion fish and crustaceans are also killed for human consumption.
  • Despite success in the Netherlands, early data suggests progress is slow—these retailers increased plant-based shares by just 1.4 percentage points in a year, leaving them off track to meet 2030 targets. We think that the space could benefit from a new, innovative charity that will help supermarkets find and test ways to displace meat sales and meet their commitments.
• Neglectedness:
  • Great work is being done by ProVeg, Green Protein Alliance, Wakker Dier, Madre Brava, Albert Schweitzer Foundation, and WWF across Europe but there are still many countries in Europe not being targeted and approximately no work being done outside of Europe.

The Solution

• What’s the proposed solution?
  • Lobby food retailers to commit to a certain ratio of protein sales by a target year (e.g., 60:40 plant:animal protein sales by 2040) by conducting corporate campaigns and providing technical assistance to supermarkets to encourage consumer purchasing of plant-based protein.
• Why do we trust this solution?
  • We are encouraged by progress in the Netherlands, where 13 supermarkets with a total market share greater than 90% have committed to 60:40 protein sales ratios by 2030. Similar commitments are also starting to be made outside of the Netherlands.
  • In the first year following their commitment, Dutch supermarkets increased plant-based protein ratios from 40.2 to 41.6% on average.
• How robust is the evidence?
  • The evidence base for this intervention is relatively weak, but promising, relying largely on case studies.
  • Experimental evidence shows that interventions like price parity, promotions, and changes to the food environment can boost plant-based sales.

The Impact

• What impact could this have?
  • Supermarkets account for a majority (>90%) of food sales in high-income countries. If the market majority of supermarkets in Australia (one of the recommended target countries), achieved a 60:40 plant:animal protein ratio by 2040 this could avert 24 million tonnes of CO₂e emissions and spare 490 million animals per year.
• Estimated cost-effectiveness:
  • Achieving 60:40 plant:animal protein sales ratios by 2040 in Australia is expected to avert up to 177 SADs/$ and cost $0.18 per tCO₂e averted. This is well above our bar of 8 SADs/$ and $33/tCO₂e for this round. 

Ideal Founder Profile

• Who is best suited to do this?
  • We think strong generalists could do well deploying this intervention and don’t expect specialist skills to be a must.
  • This intervention looks cost-effective in 40+ high- or upper-middle income countries so we think that the target country could be determined by founder backgrounds. However, particularly promising target countries could be: Australia, Austria, France, Northern European countries (Sweden, Norway, Estonia), and Brazil.
  • The following backgrounds, skills or profiles would likely be useful for the co-founders or early hires in this organization but are not a necessity:
    • Familiarity with and/or expertise in food systems, particularly the food retail sector
    • Corporate engagement experience, especially working on corporate advocacy campaigns related to the environment or animal welfare
    • Existing network or ability to network with existing nonprofits working to promote plant-based diets

Securing Scale-up Funding for Alternative Proteins 

Summary

• This is the first alternative protein intervention that AIM has ever recommended, and we are excited to invest in an alternative path to victory for the animal movement.
• Giving Green finds that promoting alternative proteins to reduce demand for conventional meat is one of the most promising climate interventions and recommends the Good Food Institute (GFI) as one of its top non-profits.
• This work is very neglected. Scale-up funding has been historically underinvested relative to R&D funding. Currently, only one person in GFI's 15-person US policy team and one person in their 12-person Europe policy team are focused on securing scale-up funding. 

The Problem

• What’s the problem?
  • Most alternative protein startups face high capital expenditure (CapEx) requirements estimated between $15 million and $250 million to build a single commercial facility. Yet, they struggle to attract investment due to perceived risk and uncertain returns. This underinvestment leads to high prices and limited availability, preventing alternative proteins from reaching cost parity with animal products and the scale necessary to displace these products.
• Why does it matter?
  • Globally, food systems are responsible for major environmental impacts. Food systems account for 33% of anthropogenic greenhouse emissions, use 70% of the world's available fresh water, and use 50% of the world’s habitable land. Animal production is responsible for the majority (roughly 36 to 60%) of the food systems environmental impacts.
  • Animal production also results in the immense suffering of billions of farm animals annually. Roughly 85.44 billion land animals are slaughtered annually for meat, and as many as 78 to 171 billion fish and crustaceans are also killed for human consumption.
  • Alternative protein companies are struggling and shutting down due to impact investors and VCs pulling out of the space. We need government investment support to allow these companies to survive,  grow, and hopefully encourage private investors to re-invest.
• Neglectedness:
  • Scale-up funding has historically been underinvested compared to R&D funding. 16 scale-up funding grants have been made across eight countries vs. 336 grants made across 28 countries for R&D.
  • There is likely less than 5 FTE working in non-profits to secure scale-up funding from governments globally. 

The Solution

• What’s the proposed solution?
  • Lobby governments to allocate funds for loan guarantee programmes, infrastructure grants, and other financial interventions that could be made available to alternative protein companies attempting to scale.
• Why do we trust this solution?
  • Historically, public investment and policy support have been vital to help new technologies scale. The success of solar panels, electric vehicles, and certain vaccines all relied on public procurement, tax incentives, loan guarantees, and grants to reduce early-stage commercial risk and encourage investor confidence.
  • Supporting alternative proteins is promising for its climate and animal impacts and aligns with broader policy goals such as national security, sustainability, and food security.
• How robust is the evidence?
  • GFI has been very successful in lobbying governments to secure R&D funding. We estimate that GFI raised $1.67 in funding for each dollar spent.
  • We are also starting to see success in securing scale-up funding, with the average infrastructure grant totalling $14.1M. 

The Impact

• What impact could this have?
  • Helping alternative proteins scale and displace meat consumption could avert 9.9 million tonnes of CO₂e emissions and spare 196 million animals.
• Estimated cost-effectiveness:
  • Although more speculative, our cost-effectiveness analysis estimates that this intervention could avert 3-51 SADs/$ and cost $0.5-10 per tCO2e averted. 

Ideal Founder Profile

• Who is best suited to do this?
  • A skilled generalist with strong communication and strategic thinking skills could handle most of the core tasks, including policy analysis, relationship-building, and persuasive materials production.
  • There would be a great benefit to the founding team having local policy experience as this political contextual knowledge and/or existing connections could speed up the charity’s progress.
  • The founding team would also benefit greatly from having previous experience working in alternative proteins or having a good overview of the alternative protein landscape in the target countries (the US, UK, Canada, Germany, Netherlands, and Singapore seem particularly promising).

Please note that in addition to the above ideas, two previous recommended animal welfare ideas will be available to the February 2026 cohort:

Cage-free Campaigning in the Middle East

Summary

This intervention recommends launching a new organization to drive cage-free corporate reforms in the Middle East, starting with the UAE, Saudi Arabia, and Egypt. The approach uses constructive, business-focused advocacy to secure animal welfare commitments in a neglected region. Based on extensive evidence, expert endorsement, and the proven impact of similar campaigns, this new charity could avert ~30 suffering-adjusted days (SADs) per dollar spent, significantly improving farmed animal welfare.

The Problem

Across the globe, laying hens suffer in extreme confinement—often with space smaller than an A4 sheet of paper. While cage-free reforms have gained traction in the US and Europe, most countries outside these regions—including those in the Middle East—lag far behind. For instance, the UAE, Saudi Arabia, and Egypt have virtually no cage-free policies or commitments in place, despite millions of hens being affected. Battery cages cause chronic stress, muscle atrophy, and severe pain, and the suffering they inflict is extreme and prolonged. Consumers in wealthier Middle Eastern countries already pay premiums for “value-added” products like fortified eggs, suggesting latent demand for higher-welfare products. Yet no major charity currently works to convert this willingness into meaningful welfare gains. Without targeted campaigns in the region, it’s likely that millions more hens will remain trapped in harmful systems for decades to come.

The Solution

This idea recommends founding a new organization to conduct collaborative cage-free corporate outreach in the Middle East. Rather than adversarial tactics, this strategy frames cage-free sourcing as a business opportunity for retailers and food companies. The charity would build relationships with corporate decision-makers, offer technical assistance, and highlight the branding and consumer appeal of high-welfare egg products—especially in a market with high disposable incomes and interest in product quality. The campaign would likely start in the UAE, leveraging its regional leadership status to catalyze change across the Gulf. Potential low-hanging fruits include large regional retailers like Spinney’s (operating Waitrose UAE stores) and LuLu. Over time, the charity could expand to Saudi Arabia and Egypt and pivot to broiler welfare once cage-free traction is established. With no other actors working on this issue in the region, this charity would fill a critical gap in the global animal welfare movement.

The Impact

A new charity in this space could reach tens of millions of hens across three high-priority countries. At scale, its campaigns are expected to avert between 3.2 and 25.1 million Suffering-Adjusted Days (SADs) annually. Discounting for future costs and benefits, the organization would operate at an estimated cost-effectiveness of 30 SADs per dollar spent—well above Charity Entrepreneurship’s bar for animal welfare interventions. Given the potential for precedent-setting effects across the Gulf region, the intervention could unlock broader systemic reforms beyond the initial countries targeted, driving long-term, regional impact on the lives of farmed animals.

Ideal Founder Profile

• Who is best suited to do this?
  • The ideal founding team will be composed of skilled generalists who are strong communicators, relationship-builders, and able to navigate business environments. No technical animal welfare experience is needed, but familiarity with the Middle Eastern business or regulatory landscape is a strong plus. Local co-founders or those with deep cultural fluency and language skills would be especially well-positioned to build trust with corporate partners. Founders should be motivated by animal welfare, adaptable to working in new and evolving contexts, and persistent in securing incremental corporate change without resorting to high-pressure tactics. While prior corporate campaigning experience is a bonus, commitment to learning and implementing evidence-based strategies is more important.

Reducing Keel Bone Fractures in Cage-Free Egg Production

Summary

As the egg industry transitions to cage-free systems, many hens continue to suffer from keel bone fractures—a painful, widespread condition. We recommend launching a charity that advocates for evidence-informed changes in husbandry and aviary design. Despite uncertainty around the most effective intervention levers, initial modelling suggests this could be a cost-effective way to reduce animal suffering, particularly if traction is gained with large producers and welfare-certification schemes.

The Problem

Keel bone fractures are among the most prevalent and painful conditions affecting laying hens in cage-free systems, impacting roughly 60% to 97% of birds by the end of lay. These injuries—caused by collisions with perches, genetic predisposition, or high egg production—can result in chronic pain, impaired mobility, and reduced quality of life. With cage-free housing expanding globally, the absolute number of affected hens is likely increasing. Yet most stakeholders remain unaware of the issue, and relatively little attention has been given to prevention. Unlike some other welfare issues, fractures may be harder for producers to detect, and consumers are unlikely to be aware. Without external pressure or support, producers may have limited incentive or knowledge to adopt improvements. Given the scale and severity of the problem, even modest reductions in fracture incidence could represent a meaningful welfare gain—especially if implemented across large, commercial systems.

The Solution

We propose launching a new organization that works with egg producers and standard-setting bodies to encourage uptake of measures that may reduce the incidence or severity of keel bone fractures. These measures could include modifications to aviary design, improved perch materials, better lighting, nutritional changes, or selective breeding. The charity would likely focus on a few high-impact strategies, informed by current evidence and expert consultation. By engaging with welfare certification schemes and industry associations, the organization could support sector-wide improvements without requiring mass consumer mobilization. While no single intervention currently guarantees substantial reductions in fractures, there is promising, though mixed, evidence for several low-cost changes. The organization would take an adaptive approach—starting with the best-supported strategies while piloting, evaluating, and iterating based on new evidence. Although the evidence base is not yet definitive, this area remains highly neglected, and strategic engagement may enable tractable and cost-effective harm reduction at scale. reduction at scale.

The Impact

Our modelling suggests that under plausible assumptions, this intervention could avert an estimated 10 to 60 suffering-adjusted days (SADs) per dollar spent—potentially exceeding our cost-effectiveness bar for animal welfare interventions. However, these estimates are subject to significant uncertainty, particularly around the effectiveness and uptake of different strategies. If successful, a new charity could influence practices affecting tens of millions of hens annually, either through direct engagement or by shifting sector norms via certification standards. Even if only partially successful, incremental improvements to current cage-free systems could reduce substantial cumulative suffering over time.

Ideal Founder Profile

• Who is best suited to do this?
  • This charity would benefit from founders who are both strategic and evidence-driven, able to navigate an evolving and technical field with a high degree of nuance. Ideal candidates would have strong communication skills and the ability to collaborate with producers, industry stakeholders, and animal welfare certifiers. A background in animal welfare science, animal behavior, or poultry systems could be useful but is not essential. What matters most is a commitment to improving animal welfare in pragmatic ways, openness to uncertainty, and a willingness to test and iterate. Founders should be comfortable working in a space where the evidence base is still developing and success is likely to depend on relationship-building and sector-wide trust.

Apply to our program to help launch these organizations

We encourage you to learn more about these ideas here and sign up for the upcoming online events, where you will have the opportunity to have your questions answered by our program, research, and recruitment teams. 

Curious about nonprofit entrepreneurship? Hear directly from our founders about what inspired them to take the leap. 

Unfamiliar with our program? The Charity Entrepreneurship Incubation Program is a free 2-month training program that helps you find an evidence-based idea for a new charity, a talented co-founder to build a new organization with up to $200,000 in seed funding. We have successfully incubated over 50 charities, reaching 75+ million people and 1+ billion animals. Read about the success stories of some of our charities, or learn more about what it’s like to be on the program.