Animal Charity Evaluators (ACE) is an independent nonprofit organization that uses evidence and research to identify effective ways of reducing animal suffering. It evaluates animal protection organizations, recommends high-impact charities, publishes research for donors and advocates, and distributes funding through its Recommended Charity Fund, Greatest Needs Fund, and Movement Grants program.
Introduction
Animal Charity Evaluators helps donors, philanthropists, advocates, and animal protection organizations make evidence-informed decisions about how to use money, time, and other resources to help animals.
ACE operates as a charity evaluator, research organization, grantmaker, and donor advisory resource. Unlike a conventional foundation that primarily distributes grants, ACE combines funding with charity assessments, intervention research, public recommendations, and educational resources.
The organization focuses on opportunities that can help large numbers of animals, particularly where animal suffering is extensive and advocacy remains neglected or underfunded.
Organization at a Glance
- Full name: Animal Charity Evaluators
- Abbreviation: ACE
- Founded: 2012
- Original name: Effective Animal Activism
- Current name adopted: December 2013
- Organization type: Independent nonprofit charity evaluator, research organization, and grantmaker
- Legal status: United States 501(c)(3) nonprofit public charity
- Employer Identification Number: 36-4684978
- Headquarters: Covina, California, United States
- Geographic scope: Global
- Primary focus: Effective animal advocacy and the reduction of animal suffering
- Executive Director: Stien van der Ploeg
- Board Chair: Ravi Mulani
- Main grantmaking program: Movement Grants
- Other funding vehicles: Recommended Charity Fund and Greatest Needs Fund
History and Background
Animal Charity Evaluators began in 2012 under the name Effective Animal Activism. It was initially established as an intern project of 80,000 Hours, a United Kingdom-based organization focused on helping people pursue high-impact careers.
The initiative emerged in response to a gap in the animal protection sector: donors and advocates had limited evidence-based guidance about which interventions and organizations could help animals most effectively.
In 2013, the initiative merged with a United States 501(c)(3) nonprofit and revised its mission around identifying and promoting highly effective opportunities to help animals. It rebranded as Animal Charity Evaluators in December 2013.
ACE developed within the broader effective altruism and effective animal advocacy communities. Its approach emphasizes evidence, reasoning, transparency, cost effectiveness, neglected problems, organizational capacity, and the potential to generate substantial improvements for animals.
Over time, ACE expanded beyond charity recommendations. Its activities now include global grantmaking, research synthesis, donor education, intervention analysis, public resources for animal advocates, and monitoring of funding influenced by its recommendations.
Mission and Purpose
ACE’s central purpose is to find and promote the most effective ways to help animals.
The organization seeks to reduce animal suffering by directing attention and resources toward effective charities, promising advocacy interventions, neglected animal populations, and regions where the animal protection movement remains underdeveloped.
Its work serves several interconnected purposes:
- Helping donors identify high-impact animal charities
- Evaluating how organizations use resources and create change
- Funding innovative and underrepresented animal advocacy projects
- Producing accessible research on animal protection interventions
- Encouraging stronger monitoring, evaluation, and learning practices
- Expanding animal advocacy into neglected regions and issue areas
- Supporting a more diverse and resilient global animal protection movement
ACE recognizes that animal suffering occurs across different contexts, including intensive farming systems, aquatic animal production, wild animal populations, and other settings in which animals experience preventable harm.
How Animal Charity Evaluators Defines Effectiveness
ACE does not assess organizations only by their visibility, size, or emotional appeal. Its evaluation process considers whether an organization’s work is likely to create meaningful improvements for animals and whether additional funding can be used productively.
Its current charity evaluations examine three principal areas:
- Impact: Whether the organization’s programs are likely to produce substantial benefits for animals
- Room for More Funding: Whether the organization can effectively use additional financial resources
- Organizational Health: Whether its leadership, culture, governance, strategy, and internal systems support sustained impact
ACE examines publicly available information, requests documentation from participating organizations, studies the interventions and countries in which they operate, and consults experts familiar with relevant contexts. Cost effectiveness can inform the assessment, but ACE also considers systemic change, uncertainty, long-term outcomes, and interventions whose effects cannot easily be reduced to a single numerical measure.
Governance and Structure
Animal Charity Evaluators is governed by a Board of Directors and managed by an international team working across leadership, programs, research, development, communications, finance, and operations.
As of 2026, the organization lists:
- Ravi Mulani: Board Chair
- Amy Odene: Board Secretary
- Tom Bilello: Board Treasurer
- Jacob Peacock: Board Member
- John Seber: Board Member
- Karolina Skowron-Baka: Board Member
- Pranav Merchant: Board Member
- William McAuliffe: Board Member
ACE’s senior leadership includes Executive Director Stien van der Ploeg and directors responsible for programs, finance, operations, development, and communications. Its wider team includes researchers, charity evaluation specialists, development staff, communications professionals, and operational personnel.
The Board provides organizational oversight, while staff members conduct research, manage grantmaking and charity evaluations, communicate findings, support donors, and administer the organization’s operations.
ACE also works with advisors and external specialists who contribute expertise in animal welfare, ethics, philanthropy, research, nonprofit management, and effective advocacy.
Transparency and Accountability
Transparency is a central part of ACE’s organizational model. Its website provides access to financial reports, audited financial statements, tax filings, governance documents, organizational policies, annual reports, and information about its evaluation methods.
ACE publishes policies covering conflicts of interest and other governance matters. It states that it does not consider itself for its own charity recommendations because doing so would create a conflict of interest.
The organization’s evaluation and grantmaking systems also use conflict-of-interest procedures intended to protect the independence of decisions.
Its transparency resources include:
- Financial statements and annual tax filings
- Organizational bylaws
- Governance and operational policies
- Conflict-of-interest procedures
- Annual reports
- Research and evaluation methodologies
- Information about grant distributions
- Processes for reporting errors or concerns
ACE is a registered 501(c)(3) nonprofit public charity in the United States. This status supports its ability to receive tax-deductible charitable contributions from eligible U.S. donors.
Funding Mechanisms
ACE finances its work primarily through charitable donations. Supporters can contribute to the organization’s operations or direct funding through designated funds that benefit recommended charities and animal advocacy projects.
Donations to Animal Charity Evaluators
Unrestricted or operational donations support ACE’s research, charity evaluations, donor education, grant administration, communications, staffing, and organizational infrastructure.
These contributions allow ACE to investigate animal advocacy interventions and provide its findings publicly.
Recommended Charity Fund
The Recommended Charity Fund collects donations and distributes them among ACE’s current Recommended Charities.
Funding decisions consider the organizations’ current financial positions and their room for more funding. This means allocations may differ rather than being divided equally.
Greatest Needs Fund
The Greatest Needs Fund gives ACE flexibility to direct donations toward areas it identifies as having the greatest current need.
Depending on its assessment, funding may support Recommended Charities or recipients of Movement Grants. This flexible model allows ACE to respond to emerging gaps and funding needs within the animal advocacy movement.
Movement Grants
Movement Grants is ACE’s strategic grantmaking program for strengthening the global animal advocacy movement.
The program prioritizes promising initiatives that:
- Use innovative or comparatively neglected approaches
- Have the potential to help large numbers of animals
- Operate in regions underrepresented in animal advocacy
- Address neglected species or welfare issues
- Strengthen local or regional advocacy capacity
- Test approaches that may generate useful evidence for the wider movement
Funding cycles may vary because ACE adjusts the program in response to changing needs and strategic gaps. Grant decisions are made through a review process rather than through an automatic or permanently fixed funding formula.
Major Programs and Initiatives
Charity Evaluations and Recommendations
ACE evaluates selected animal charities and identifies organizations that appear capable of creating substantial benefits for animals while effectively using additional funding.
Recommended Charity status is not a permanent designation. Organizations are periodically reassessed, and recommendations can change as evidence, programs, funding needs, and organizational circumstances evolve.
ACE’s 2025 Recommended Charities included:
- Animal Welfare Observatory
- Aquatic Life Institute
- Çiftlik Hayvanlarını Koruma Derneği
- Dansk Vegetarisk Forening
- Good Food Fund
- Shrimp Welfare Project
- Sinergia Animal
- Sociedade Vegetariana Brasileira
- The Humane League
- Wild Animal Initiative
These organizations work across areas such as farmed animal welfare, aquatic animal protection, corporate outreach, government engagement, food-system reform, research, movement building, and wild animal welfare.
Better for Animals
Better for Animals is an evidence-based public resource that summarizes research on animal advocacy interventions.
The initiative examines approaches such as protests, network building, corporate outreach, policy advocacy, public engagement, and other methods used to improve animal welfare.
Its purpose is to make research more accessible and help advocates, donors, and organizations understand when particular interventions may be effective, where evidence remains uncertain, and what questions require further study.
Research and Resources
ACE publishes research reports, charity reviews, intervention assessments, research digests, cause-prioritization resources, and practical tools for animal protection organizations.
Its research library helps users explore evidence relevant to animal welfare interventions. Resources also address farmed animals, wild animals, advocacy strategies, organizational health, and decision-making under uncertainty.
Donor Guidance
ACE provides information to help donors compare charities and direct contributions toward programs with the potential to generate substantial benefits for animals.
Donors can support individual Recommended Charities, contribute to pooled funds, or finance ACE’s evaluation and research activities.
Impact and Examples of Work Funded
ACE measures its influence through grants distributed, donations directed toward recommended organizations, research use, donor engagement, and the growth of effective animal advocacy in underserved regions.
Between January 2019 and March 2025, ACE reported that more than $58 million in donations to recommended charities had been identified as influenced by its work
From January through November 2025, ACE raised approximately $3.4 million for the Recommended Charity Fund and Movement Grants combined. Its 2025 review also reported a Recommended Charity Fund distribution of approximately $1.8 million.
Examples of work supported through ACE’s funding and recommendations include:
- Improving welfare standards for chickens, pigs, fishes, and farmed shrimps
- Securing corporate animal welfare commitments
- Supporting government policy and legislative advocacy
- Expanding access to plant-based food
- Conducting investigations and public awareness campaigns
- Building advocacy networks in underrepresented regions
- Researching the welfare of wild animals
- Developing evidence about emerging animal protection interventions
- Strengthening organizational capacity among smaller advocacy groups
For example, Sinergia Animal works across Latin America and Southeast Asia through corporate engagement, policy advocacy, investigations, and plant-based food initiatives. Shrimp Welfare Project focuses on improving conditions for farmed shrimps and is estimated by ACE to help more than 1,000 animals per dollar.
These examples demonstrate ACE’s emphasis on animal populations and regions that may receive less attention from conventional animal welfare funding.
Who Can Benefit from ACE’s Work?
ACE’s research, recommendations, and funding programs are relevant to:
- Individual donors seeking effective animal charities
- Philanthropic foundations and animal welfare funders
- Animal protection organizations
- Researchers and academic institutions
- Corporate and policy advocates
- Emerging advocacy groups
- Organizations working in underrepresented regions
- Professionals designing animal welfare interventions
- Members of the effective altruism and effective animal advocacy communities
Organizations interested in funding should consult the current Movement Grants application guidance because eligibility requirements, strategic priorities, and application schedules may change between funding cycles.
Animal charities interested in evaluation should review ACE’s charity evaluation process separately. Applying for evaluation does not automatically result in a recommendation or grant.
Why Animal Charity Evaluators Matters
The animal protection sector includes thousands of charities using different approaches, but donors often lack comparable information about their effectiveness, financial needs, and potential impact.
ACE addresses this problem by connecting research, charity evaluation, grantmaking, and donor guidance.
Its work is particularly significant because it:
- Encourages evidence-based animal philanthropy
- Directs resources toward neglected animals and regions
- Supports emerging and established organizations
- Makes evaluation findings publicly accessible
- Examines both immediate and long-term forms of change
- Promotes transparency and organizational health
- Helps funders respond to uncertainty more strategically
- Builds knowledge about interventions that may reduce animal suffering
Conclusion
Animal Charity Evaluators plays a distinctive role in global animal welfare philanthropy by combining independent charity evaluation, intervention research, donor guidance, and strategic grantmaking. Since beginning as Effective Animal Activism in 2012, it has developed into an international resource for people and organizations seeking evidence-based ways to reduce animal suffering.
Through Recommended Charities, Movement Grants, pooled funding mechanisms, and public research initiatives such as Better for Animals, ACE directs funding toward promising organizations while strengthening knowledge across the animal advocacy movement.
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