“Solidarity and trust in response to a year of crises”

With disbelief and horror, we witnessed Russia invade Ukraine. A war on the European continent: an unimaginable scenario with terrible consequences for the Ukrainian people. “It was a year of pain”, remarked President Zelensky reflecting one year after the Russian invasion, “But it was also a year of resilience, care and hope.” It was heartening to see that many people welcomed millions of refugees or assisted them through different means. It is encouraging that Europe remains united and stands in solidarity during these dark days.

specifically discussed the power of collaboration, innovation and trust in resolving societal issues.

People & Nature

How do you form an alliance with 15 different organizations? What can we learn from the challenges we face? We asked these questions to Anne Rémy, coordinator of the Med Sea Alliance, Aniol Esteban, director of member organization Marilles Foundation, and Karlijn Steinbusch, our People & Nature program manager.

Social Initiatives

Martijn Meijer Director of programs

Economic instability and high inflation, partly caused by the war, have far-reaching repercussions that extend beyond Ukraine’s borders, also affecting places like the Netherlands. Rising costs of living mean that more and more people are struggling in making ends meet. Our partners are increasingly being called upon to respond to this demand for support. As a result of this increasing responsibility, Adessium talked with partner organizations to see where we could help. You can read more about this in the chapter on our Flexible Funding (page 52).

Talks with our partners

For this Annual Report, we approached our partner organizations with whom we collaborate in our programs. We

Tjerk Mulder, business director of Quiet Nederland, Bas Pieck, program leader at Kansfonds, and Job Rijneveld, program manager of our Social Initiatives program, had a good conversation about the concept of trust. How can we, as a society, create more trust when helping people in vulnerable situations? And what can the government learn from civil society?

Public Interest

What is the state of our democracy? And what role does transparency play in our citizens’ trust in public institutions? Lousewies van der Laan, director of Transparency International Nederland, Yves Dejaeghere, director of the Federation for Innovation in Democracy Europe (FIDE), and our

Public Interest program manager

Martijn Roos, discussed this with each other.

Learning organization

You can also read an interview with Lizzy Eilbracht in this Annual Report (page 56). Adessium welcomed Lizzy to the team in February 2022 as the strategic learning manager – a new position that demonstrates our dedication to delving deeper into the topics we support. For example, Lizzy helps the team in developing research questions that guides our work better. In our interview with her, she provides insight into some important lessons she has formulated for our foundation.

Farewell to Saskia van den Dool

This year, we say goodbye to our managing director, Saskia van den Dool. As a passionate director and pioneer she expanded our projects, programs and team. We are immensely grateful to Saskia for her efforts and wish her every success in her future endeavors.

Resilience, care and hope

In line with Zelensky’s words, we express our pride in the resilience in which our partners continue their work, despite the difficult circumstances. We are moved by the care and thoughtfulness they show in their everyday work with those who are currently struggling more than others.

And we are hopeful that our collective efforts with our grantees can make a difference when we join forces.

A medical team in the intensive care unit of the Doctors without Borders medical evacuation train. They monitor and stabilize a seriouslyinjured patient during a long journey from eastern to western Ukraine.