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Survey design
The survey content was designed with the advisory support from internal and external reviewers with expertise in our structural focus areas of food systems, environment, energy, and climate, as well as reviewers with expertise on global corporate power, finance, worker rights, and democratic rights. We drew from reviewers in different institutional roles and relationships to Asia-Pacific social movements, including policy advocacy, labor organizers, and grassroots community-based organizations.
Respondents were informed that we intend to use the information gathered from the survey to facilitate collective dialogue, collaboration, and thought leadership amongst our Institute and climate, agri-food, and environmental organizations across Asia-Pacific. To foster trust and accountability, respondents were also informed that we intended to share the findings from the survey with their organization, including through this white paper.
Respondents were asked to select one choice, select their top three choices, and write-in short responses to answer questions about their organization. These survey questions are available in appendix B. Write-in responses pertained only to the respondent’s information, organizations the respondent’s own organization is partnered with, and any additional information the respondent wished to share and that was not already covered in the survey. Responses were not anonymous.
Survey audience and dissemination
The survey was distributed directly to the climate, agri-food, and environmental organizations identified and recorded in our database, which we also used for the online content analysis portion of this body of work. These organizations were initially identified using the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) List of Accredited Organizations, our regional networks, Google Search, social media platforms and, where search engines and other such tools presented limitations, generative AI tools were employed to enhance the search process. This was particularly helpful for countries and territories with less online visibility or where language barriers made information retrieval more challenging. The research covered countries and territories across six subregions of the Asia-Pacific: Central Asia, East Asia, Oceania, South Asia, Southeast Asia, and West Asia.
The criteria for dissemination and participation were:
- the organization identifies as an NGO, nonprofit, or community-based organization; a government entity or initiative; a university or research center; a social enterprise; or a union;
- the organization is based in Asia-Pacific;
- the organization works on climate, agri-food, and/or environmental issues.
Organizations that completed the survey but did not meet these criteria have not been included in these findings. The list of organizations that completed the survey and meet these criteria is available in appendix A.
Survey instrument
The survey was designed and disseminated through Microsoft Forms, a web-based platform used to create and conduct online surveys. The survey collected information about respondents’ roles in their organization, the organization itself and their partner organizations, as well as the missions, approaches, and needs of Asia-Pacific organizations that are working on climate, agri-food, and environmental issues across the region. The survey was distributed in Arabic, English, Hindi, Indonesian, Mandarin Chinese, Thai, and Vietnamese.19 The survey questions are available in English in appendix B.
Who we heard from
The survey ran from August 15 to September 30 and was extended twice to reach as many Asia-Pacific countries and organizations as possible. During this period, we heard from a total 60 unique Asia-Pacific climate, agri-food, and environmental organizations.
Location: We heard from respondents whose organizations are based in 29 countries and operate across all six regions of Asia-Pacific as defined by the United Nations. Several of the participating organizations operate in multiple countries and regions, and the regions most represented include South Asia (29 organizations), Southeast Asia (23 organizations), and West Asia (12 organizations). The countries most represented include Indonesia (8 organizations), India (6 organizations), Afghanistan (5 organizations), Malaysia (5 organizations) and Pakistan (5 organizations).
Scale: We heard from respondents whose organizations work at and across diverse scales. The dominant operational focus is the local–national scale, with many organizations operating at both the local and national level. A total of 76.6 percent of organizations operate at the local level while 78.3 percent operate at the national level, suggesting that most organizations are grounded in local contexts but engage with national-level networks or policy. A quarter (25 percent) operate across multiple neighboring countries, reflecting increasing regional coordination (e.g., in ASEAN, South Asia, or the Pacific Islands). A smaller subset (11.6 percent) identifies global-level work—typically advocacy networks, research institutes, or regional coalitions with international partnerships. Just 6.6 percent of organizations operate across the entire Asia-Pacific region.
Most organizations responded that they work at the national level (78.3%) and the local level (76.6%)
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Partners: We heard from respondents whose organizations maintain diverse partnerships. Most respondents’ organizations work with other organizations in Asia-Pacific (73.3 percent). Fewer respondents’ organizations work with organizations outside of Asia-Pacific (45 percent). We found that organizations that work at the local level largely work with other organizations in Asia-Pacific (79.5 percent), while fewer that work at the local level work with organizations outside Asia-Pacific (56.4 percent).
Most organizations responded that they work with other organizations in Asia-Pacific (73.3%)
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Language: Respondents overwhelmingly spoke English (93 percent) with Bahasa Indonesia (8.3 percent) and Arabic/Hindi (5 percent each) being the next most common languages.
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- 19Translations were conducted by native speakers familiar with the survey’s thematic context. Particular attention was given to culturally sensitive or conceptually nuanced terms (e.g., “just transition,” “extractive economies”) to preserve their intended meaning across languages.
