Social impact leaders urge new thinking as aid models evolve

As international development funding continues to shrink, social impact leaders across Africa are being pushed to rethink sustainability, strengthen local systems, and build partnerships that can hold up beyond donor cycles.

Those questions framed a webinar hosted by Impact Forum Kenya titled “Sustaining Social Impact in a Shifting Aid Landscape: Donor Perspectives,” held on June 18, 2026.

The session brought together voices from philanthropy, corporate foundations, and community development to reflect on how organizations are adapting to a changing funding environment.

What emerged early in the discussion was a shared tension: reduced foreign aid is straining organizations, but it is also opening space for experimentation, collaboration, and more locally grounded solutions.

Setting the tone, Grace Maingi, Executive Director of the Kenya Community Development Foundation (KCDF), brought the conversation back to a principle she described as non-negotiable communities must remain at the center of development.

“Our whole philosophy is that communities are and should be at the center of all development, they should be the ones driving the development, and we see ourselves more as a facilitator,” said Maingi.

She noted that while declining aid flows introduce uncertainty, they are also accelerating the push toward locally led development.

Still, she cautioned that many grassroots organizations continue to struggle within systems that were not designed for them.

Community actors, she explained, are often required to navigate rigid donor tools from log frames to strict risk assessments that rarely reflect the realities of their work on the ground.

“We see our role at KCDF as de-risking some of this work,” she said.

When the discussion moved into the corporate philanthropy space, Henry Kilonzo, Senior Manager, M-Pesa and Safaricom Foundations, pointed to disruption as a consistent driver of change.

“When there is strife, definitely people become more innovative,” said Kilonzo.

 “Every threat may turn, most of the threats may turn to be opportunities for people to innovate and do things better that they could not have done if the status quo were sustained.”

For him, the pressure created by shrinking resources should force a shift in how organizations define impact away from activity-driven programming and toward long-term outcomes.

“In terms of abundance, there is a likelihood organizations focus on just activities, ticking boxes, because resources are available,” he said.

“But when there is a reduction in funding, there’s a likelihood of organizations focusing on outcomes.”

He added that this transition is ultimately about durability rather than delivery.

“Projects will end, but systems will endure,” Kilonzo said.

That idea of long-term sustainability carried naturally into the next strand of the discussion, partnerships.

Lillies Njaga, Program Officer for East Africa at the Conrad N. Hilton Foundation, emphasized that despite shifts in the funding landscape, some actors remain constant.

“The Hilton Foundation may cease to exist, hopefully not, and other like funders and partners, but the government will always be there,” said Njaga.

For her, that reality makes government alignment essential. She argued that organizations seeking lasting impact must design their work in ways that can be absorbed into public systems.

She also noted a gradual but important shift: governments across Africa are increasingly open to collaboration, creating more room for funders and implementers to engage at scale.

Across all three perspectives, one thread became difficult to miss survival in the social impact space is becoming less about dependency and more about diversification.

Returning to that point, Maingi cautioned organizations against overreliance on a single funding source.

“You must diversify your funding sources. Don’t rely on just one funder or one funding source,” she said.

She encouraged organizations to explore alternative models, pointing to free resources on financial resilience, asset building, and local fundraising. In some cases, she noted, social enterprise approaches are already helping groups sustain their work.

She cited examples such as mobile toilet businesses and handmade accessories that help fund education and girls’ empowerment programmes.

As the conversation opened up to audience questions, attention turned to how smaller and emerging organizations can stay credible in an increasingly competitive funding environment.

Maingi acknowledged that while newer organizations may lack long-term data, trust built within communities often carries significant weight.

“The most important thing is the social capital. Is there a footprint of the work you’ve been doing?” she said.

Kilonzo added that partnerships with more established organizations can also help smaller groups strengthen credibility and access wider funding opportunities.

In closing, the panel urged organizations not to interpret the funding squeeze as a retreat, but as a moment of adjustment.

Kilonzo challenged participants to consider a harder question: whether their work would still matter without donor support.

“If your answer to these questions is a yes, then the organization that you work with has a future,” he said.

He added, “Let’s not waste this crisis that we are in in terms of reduced aid, but let us use it as an opportunity.”

By the end of the session, there was clear agreement that the future of social impact will depend less on singular funding streams and more on adaptability, stronger local ownership, broader collaboration, and more inventive financing models.

And while the aid landscape continues to shift, the underlying message remained steady: the need for impact has not diminished, only the way it must now be built.

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