Mission and Vision

Our Mission

Our mission, promoting the well-being of humanity throughout the world, remains unchanged since 1913. Today, that mission requires us to find and scale solutions to advance opportunity and reverse the climate crisis.

We believe humanity’s potential for progress is limitless, but that progress is too seldom shared by all.

Since 1913, The Rockefeller Foundation has pursued our mission to promote the well-being of humanity around the world by breaking down the barriers that limit who can be healthy, empowered, nourished, well off, secure, and free. To do so, the Foundation and its partners have made big bets that bettered the lives of billions of people and transformed the world’s public health, agriculture, and renewable energy systems.

Today, the climate crisis threatens people around the world as well as progress itself. For the first time in several generations, we face a future where the headwinds to people’s well-being grow stronger by the day—where the next generation could be worse off than its predecessor.

The world has the innovations and ideas to make tomorrow better than today. A transformation is underway in wealthier countries that proves it is possible to reverse the climate crisis while advancing human opportunity. But so far that transformation is both incomplete and inequitable—special interests and structural barriers are keeping everyone from benefiting.

We believe humanity deserves better and can do better. By accelerating—and ensuring everyone can participate—in the transformations that are underway in our energy, food, health and finance systems, the Foundation can help start a new era of progress that ensures everyone has the opportunity to be healthy, empowered, nourished, secure, and free.