Our mission is to empower in the belief that the choices people make for themselves are invariably the better ones.
Our focus is on Africa. The Continent is forecast to account for 40% of the world’s population by 2100 from 17% today. As a result poverty will become ever harder to address and resources will be under increasing strain.
The solutions must come from within and need to be affordable and scalable.
There are four prongs to our approach:
Nursery school education
Girls who can read have two children; those that don’t have five.
Nursery schools are under-resourced and teachers untrained. What’s more, play is an unfamiliar concept. Our Perivoli Schools Trust programme shows teachers how to organise their classrooms and create educational games from recycled materials.
Inspiration at zero cost.
Innovation
A third of the population are excluded from the formal economy.
Everyone in Africa has a mobile phone. Information, training, finance and health care are available at the touch of a button. Our Perivoli Innovations venture trust supports businesses that help people make the most of what’s on offer.
Everyone wants to get on.
Policy choices
The “structural adjustments” demanded by the West are said to have done more harm than good.
Government policies are influenced by what developed countries think Africa needs. We have promoted a policy research centre at the University of Bristol that encourages high level collaboration with and within the Continent.
Let Africa decide for itself.
Climate change mitigation and adaptation
There’s not much point to approaches 1 to 3 if Africa does not adapt to the implications of climate change.
The people of Africa have contributed only 3% of green house gases but because of their location on the planet and low income levels, they are some of the most vulnerable to the implications of extreme weather. Our Perivoli Climate Trust funds Africa-led research into Climate Mitigation and Adaptation strategies.
Africa must build its own defences.
We believe that the combination of the four will lead to people making better life choices, selecting better leaders, attracting greater inward investment and using resources more sustainably.
But time is of the essence. So we need to hurry.
The Foundation is a named beneficiary of the Perivoli Trust from which it has received donations. It is anticipated that the Trustees of Perivoli Innovations will wish to donate profits to the Foundation from its portfolio of venture investments.
The Perivoli Foundation does not currently invite third party funding.
Perivoli Innovations is a venture investment trust settled by the Trustees of Perivoli Trust in 2016 which invests in early stage venture opportunities with a positive social impact. So far over seventy businesses have been backed in medtech, life sciences, climate change mitigation and productivity enhancing technologies. Almost a third of its investments are in Africa.
Details of the investments made by Perivoli Innovations and their anticipated positive social impact can be found at
www.perivoliinnovations.comThe Perivoli Schools Trust
The Perivoli Schools Trust, established in 2013, runs a nursery school teacher training programme in Sub-Saharan Africa which shows teachers the importance of play, how to organise their classrooms and, in particular, how to make educational games out of recycled materials.
Find out moreThe Perivoli Africa Research Centre (PARC)
PARC is a cross disciplinary Research Centre established at the University of Bristol in 2019 with a gift from the Perivoli Trust. The Centre aims to transform the way academic research on Africa is undertaken in the hope of helping the Continent to better advance its developmental goals.
Find out morePerivoli Climate Trust
The Perivoli Climate Trust established in 2022 funds research into Climate Change Mitigation and Adaptation strategies by Universities in Africa often in partnership with U.K. Universities with funding channelled through PARC. Its focus is on land rejuvenation, alternative sources of nutrition, water and marine management, renewable energy and animal conservation.
Find out moreFounder-led charities
The Foundation directs its third party support to small entrepreneurially led charities focussed variously on enhancing education in developing countries and war zones, aiding those with disabilities, and combatting poaching, the mistreatment of animals and the degradation of natural habitats.
Find out more