The Covéa Foundation's sponsorship initiatives

The Fondation des femmes is a leading foundation in France for women’s rights and combating violence against women. It uses the donations it receives to provide financial and legal assistance and equipment to support charities making a significant impact across France.

In 2020, during the unprecedented health crisis, there was an explosion in domestic violence. During the early days of lockdown, the Covéa Group made a donation to the Fondation des Femmes to help female victims of violence.

The Covéa Foundation is continuing with this support by means of two programmes:

• Projects that aim to help female victims of violence to leave their home, as well as providing material support for women in very vulnerable situations.
• Programmes to raise awareness among the general public about equality, stereotypes and sexism. It includes initiatives such as podcasts, an observatory, a speech contest, public information campaigns on the occasion of International Women’s Day on 8 March and the International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women on 25 November.

“The support and trust of the Covéa Foundation has enabled our foundation to develop and further its cause. The Fondation des Femmes simply would not be what it is today without the Covéa Foundation by our side!”

In 2023, the Covéa Foundation signed a two-year partnership with French non-profit Un abri qui sauve des vies.

This newly created charity focuses on providing emergency housing in mainland France for victims of domestic and intrafamily violence. It puts these people in touch with individuals or professionals able to provide temporary accommodation or offer space in their home.

Thanks to the Covéa Foundation’s support, Un Abri Qui Sauve des Vies will be able to set up new regional branches to offer its services more widely.

The charity En avant toutes works to promote gender equality and prevent gender-based violence, particularly among young people. Its projects include:

• Helping young victims of domestic or intrafamily violence by means of a chat service to ask any questions they may have about relationships, family and sexuality.
• A permanent welcome centre in Paris for victims of violence.
• Awareness and training programmes.

The funding provided by the Covéa Foundation will be used to extend the chat service to 24 hours a day, as well as to develop a specialist chat service for 10 to 14-year-olds.

Non-profit Une voix pour elles organises emergency relocations for women in the Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur region who have been victims of domestic violence, as well as their children.

It offers support in three ways:

• Help with logistics by providing free and safe removal and storage of personal items while waiting to be rehoused (items are stored for an average of nine months).
• Material support by distributing customised kits depending on what is needed (hygiene products, children’s items, clothing, food) for women and children being housed.
• Any help needed with fitting out the new home, by providing furniture and electrical goods.

The Covéa Foundation’s support will help to set up two new branches in Marseille.

This charity helps victims of female genital mutilation (FGM), forced marriage and sexual violence.

FGM affects 125,000 women in France. Les Orchidées Rouges has opened psychosocial support centres to help women rebuild their lives and aims to train and equip healthcare professionals, education professionals and legal professionals to deal with FGM.

The Covéa Foundation’s support will enable its centres to help more women.

Solenciel is a non-profit that supports women wanting to leave prostitution to rebuild their lives by finding dignified, paid and long-term work.

It helps them find employment through its cleaning agency, and also provides six hours a week of French lessons and assists with various aspects such as administration, health, childcare and joining the world of work.

The Covéa Foundation’s support will enable Solenciel to finalise the opening of new branches in Nantes and Nanterre.

Promofemmes is a Bordeaux-based charity that supports women from different countries and cultures, regardless of their social, political, cultural and religious background.

It provides all the resources needed to better integrate into social, civic, cultural and professional life within French society, primarily by means of listening and additional support through mediation and translation services.

The charity offers a variety of activities such as French lessons, artistic expression workshops, cultural outings, health workshops and discussion groups on parenting.

L’association Pierre Claver helps refugees under protection services by offering lessons in French language, as well as French history and culture.

It also offers group sporting activities and personalised support from a tutor for each beneficiary, to help them find training or employment in France.

The Covéa Foundation’s support focuses primarily on the female refugees helped by the charity.

Non-profit Marraine & Vous helps pregnant women and mothers of young children in isolation.

A mentor family helps break this cycle of loneliness by sharing simple, enriching moments to help them regain confidence and discover their skills, allowing them to live a fuller life.

In 2024, the charity was able to provide support for 85 mothers and 120 children.

Force Femmes is a charity that provides free support for unemployed women aged over 45 with getting back into work or setting up their own business, by means of group workshops or individual assistance.

Force Femmes covers 10 cities in France and since 2021 has also been developing a digital support platform to offer its services to women across the country.

Following on from the longstanding relationship between MAAF and Force Femmes, the Covéa Foundation now manages the partnership, helping to fund a dedicated forum for women looking to set up a business.

The Les Premières network helps women involved in setting up and/or developing innovative businesses with potential for employment. 25% of these women live in underprivileged areas. 

Over the last 20 years, Les Premières has worked on cultivating gender diversity in entrepreneurship as a way of fostering economic growth, and encouraging financial independence among women, who represent the minority of business owners in France.

The Covéa Foundation provides support in particular with:

• Organising MakeHerDay, a national event and the first event in France dedicated to female entrepreneurs, featuring talks from inspiring speakers, testimonies from role models, workshops on financing and one-to-one meetings with professionals.
• Première de Cordée, a nationwide training and coaching programme followed by 140 women in 2024.

The Covéa Foundation is the main sponsor of Fédération Française Handisport, the French disabled sports federation.

It supports its youth development programme, providing opportunities for young people to access sport, regardless of their disability or where they live, and to identify future elite disabled athletes.

The programme helps young people gain confidence and improve their self-esteem, thereby helping them to integrate better into society and the world of work.

Through this partnership, the Covéa Foundation also takes steps to raise awareness about disability among the Group’s employees and supports the integration of talented people with disabilities at Covéa.

Guislaine Westelynck - Chair of Fédération Française Handisport:

“We are committed with the same determination and in our day-to-day actions to ensuring the inclusion of people with disabilities in sports and society as a whole. We are grateful to the Covéa Foundation, the Covéa Group’s brands and all its employees who provide their support on the ground to share their passion for sport and bring it to life for young people, our talents of the future. These collaborations allow for mutual growth.”

Tennis Club Chauray is a tennis club that offers a wheelchair tennis section and organises a national annual wheelchair tennis tournament.

The Covéa Foundation helps fund the tournament, which also raises public awareness about disabilities through “discovery” workshops and school visits.

The French National Parks Network and the French Office for Biodiversity are working in concert to restore biodiversity, nature and the country’s landscapes.

Historically led by GMF, the partnership – now overseen by the Covéa Foundation – funds initiatives to promote access to nature and understanding about nature among all members of the public, in particular people with physical, hearing, visual and learning disabilities, as well as making nature more socially accessible to the under 26s by means of community volunteering projects.

Comme les Autres is a charity that offers personalised support for adults with disabilities following an accident who are autonomous enough to take part in an intensive programme of exciting group activities.

The charity focuses on thrill-inducing sporting activities with a mixture of disabled and non-disabled participants.

Comme les Autres has seven regional branches in France and has supported more than 1,000 people since 2011.

The Covéa Foundation has provided support in particular to create and secure the future of a branch in the Hauts-de-France region, helping 85 people over a period of three years.

Unapei is France’s leading federation of non-profits representing and defending the interests of people with learning disabilities and their families.

The Covéa Foundation supports the Unapei programme, which aims to showcase and promote the professional commitment of people with learning and cognitive disabilities, as well as their carers, whether in the business world or in the medico-social world.

Non-profit H’up Entrepreneurs helps business owners to continue to work after a disability. It also supports people with disabilities wanting to set up a business and develops a community of entrepreneurs with disabilities.

The Covéa Foundation supports a variety of initiatives, including learning about entrepreneurship, skills mentoring and the H’up Académie, which offers individual and group acceleration programmes.

Fratries is a charity that helps young people with learning difficulties or autism to find their place within society through shared living with non-disabled young people.

The Covéa Foundation’s support allowed for a new unit opened in Rennes in 2023.

La Bourguette is a charity in the Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur region that allows 200 people with autism or children with multiple disabilities to attend one of its 10 centres and live “their life” with respect and dignity, whatever their age.

With the Covéa Foundation’s support, a third space project is underway to create social ties between local residents and people with disabilities.

Atypie-Friendly is a national programme to help get neurodivergent school leavers into university or into work.

The charity aims to smooth the transition between school and higher education, helping each student find their way by providing personalised support.

It also creates educational resources to train and raise awareness among teaching staff and non-disabled students.

Atypie-Friendly has formed a partnership with 30 universities in France, helping to ensure that all students are well integrated and have the best chances of success.

Founded in 1972, the French Federation of Guide Dog Associations (FFAC) comprises 10 regional associations, 16 education centres, two national associations and a puppy breeding network.

Its work ranges from promoting guide dogs to potential beneficiaries and the general public, to getting guide dogs recognised by public authorities as a means of travel, as well as running and developing guide dog schools, professional training for guide dog educators and selecting puppy breeders.

Im'pactesNew tab is a charity that supports schooling for children in care and young adults leaving care. It covers three age groups: 5-12 year olds, 13-18 year olds and 18-25 year olds.

The charity is also aiming to become a national resource centre for improving the prevention, detection and care of children who are victims of violence.

Im’pactes has set up an innovative three-year programme in partnership with 10 voluntary organisations in the Ile-de-France region to enable 300 children and young adults to benefit from support in relation to schooling, the arts, culture and work experience.

The Covéa Foundation’s support for the charity helps to fund activities offered by partners, scholarships and driving lesson bursaries, as well as paying teachers.

Energie JeunesNew tab is a charity that aims to stop primary and middle-school children dropping out of school. It has launched an innovative educational programme to develop social and behavioural skills such as concentration, self-discipline, perseverance and self-confidence. Trained volunteers run classes three times a year, helping more than 120,000 children.

The Covéa Foundation has chosen to provide financial support for Energie Jeunes’ efforts to help primary school children, in particular with a new scheme launched by the charity targeting children from the age of 9-10. In addition to lending financial support, Covéa invites its employees to volunteer for the charity.

Employee volunteers are asked to take part in two charity initiatives. The first consists of talking to schoolchildren to teach them new methods and get them engaged. The second provides telephone support for parents of children taking part in the programme.

Trouve ta voixNew tab is a charity that helps high school students fulfil their potential, find their place in society and prepare for the world of work by training them in public speaking.

The Covéa Foundation helps fund the training of 2,000 students in, the organisation of an annual speech competition and online videos for a wider audience of high school students.

Chemins d'avenirsNew tab is a charity that helps students at middle school, high school and in higher education living in rural areas with their education, career path and as a member of society, with the aim of overcoming regional divides.

The first organisation to mentor young people in rural areas regardless of their school results and social criteria, Chemins d’Avenirs is part of the “mentor collective” scheme, a network of charities working with children all over France.

In addition to providing financial support for the charity’s activities, the Covéa Foundation asks Group employees to become mentors and devote one or two hours a month to their mentee.

NQTNew tab is a mentoring charity that provides individual support for young people from disadvantaged or deprived areas with finding employment after gaining the equivalent of a bachelor’s degree.

Covéa employees (a total of 122 in 2022) help young graduates to enter the world of work. By sharing their experience, they allow each of these young graduates in a challenging situation to pursue the career they want. The mentee, benefiting from the care and attention of a mentor, gains confidence in their talents and their future. They learn about the codes of the world of work and how to make the most of their skills.

Yazid Chir - President and co-founder of NQT:

“The world of tomorrow will tend more towards sharing, with talented and committed professionals helping young people with talent to become the same. This mutual benefit will shape the future of our societies.”

La Cravate SolidaireNew tab is a charity that combats discrimination in recruitment interviews, particularly in relation to appearance.

It helps people looking to find employment by providing them with suitable business attire, which is collected free of charge from companies and individuals, as well as offering coaching and CV-writing and interview preparation workshops.

The Covéa Foundation provides financial support and organises annual collections of clothing from the Group’s offices. For example, in 2023, collections at the Covéa Group allowed for 1,223 kg of clothing to be donated to the charity.

The charity La Cordée to encourage people from socially diverse backgrounds to apply for jobs in the public sector.

The Covéa Foundation funded support for 550 young people in 2023 and 600 in 2024 through a variety of initiatives such as individual mentoring, visits to government offices, inspiring conferences on jobs and coaching workshops.

Des Territoires aux Grandes EcolesNew tab (DTGE) is a federation that brings together students, graduates and entrepreneurs wanting to promote equal opportunity and regional development via 44 local non-profit organisations.

The Covéa Foundation funds eight student scholarships on the basis of social criteria and merit, allowing for personalised support for students pursuing paths of excellence.

Human’ITNew tab is engineering school EFREI’s endowment fund. It supports Efrei-Paris’s social and community initiatives by funding charitable projects relating to digital technology, as well as scholarships for students in difficulty.

The Covéa Foundation helps the fund by funding scholarships on the basis of social criteria and merit. Around 28% of students at the engineering school are currently on scholarships and many students are from families with incomes just below the eligibility threshold. The scholarship programme aims to help young people by limiting the risks of failure relating to too many student jobs. It therefore promotes a policy of equal opportunity for students by putting them all in a position to succeed.

Habitat et HumanismeNew tab is a collective of 59 local charities from all over France working to provide decent and suitable housing for vulnerable people and/or those who have been victims of poor housing. 

In addition to this fundamental aim, it provides support with rebuilding social ties and helping people get back into work and access healthcare services, holidays and culture.

The Covéa Foundation helps Habitat et Humanisme to support single-parent families in which the lone parent is a woman and develop third spaces.

The charity Solidarités nouvelles face au chômage helps the long-term unemployed to find work through its network of volunteer support workers across France.

The Covéa Foundation’s support has enabled it to increase the number of volunteer psychologists on the team.

France TutelleNew tab is a charity that helps family caregivers under a legal protection order as well as families thinking about or wanting to put legal arrangements in place in anticipation of their own vulnerability or that of a loved one.

France currently has around 800,000 vulnerable people under legal protection orders. With the ageing population, vulnerability constitutes a major social issue.

By supporting France Tutelle, the Covéa Foundation intends to provide concrete solutions to the challenge of vulnerability.

Comédie-Française, France’s first theatre, founded in 1680, focuses on welcoming and making itself accessible to all audiences, in particular those who have difficulty accessing culture.

The Covéa Foundation has therefore chosen to support two of its programmes:

1. Opening up the theatre to people with disabilities, excluded from society or in a socially or economically vulnerable position by offering top-level seats at very reduced rates, guided tours and meetings with actors and staff.
2. It organises shows, video clips and lectures at prisons and hospitals to reach people who are unable to go to the theatre.

Marie-Claire Janailhac-Fritsch - President of the Comédie-Française Foundation:

“The Comédie-Française Foundation brings together everyone who wants to support development and the ambitions of this unique theatre over the long term. The Foundation’s sponsors and the Comédie-Française share the same desire for excellence, which forms the basis of their shared efforts to support artistic creation, putting on shows for as many people as possible, passing on knowledge and protecting France’s heritage. The Covéa Foundation’s support is essential in ramping up the measures taken to reach a wider audience. Culture is a key factor in social cohesion and we are grateful to the Covéa Foundation for its commitment and the trust it has put in us.”

Moulin du Roc is a national theatre (Scène Nationale) in the Franch city of Niort offering a multidisciplinary programme of events.

It targets all audiences through mediation and artistic and cultural education projects targeted at schools, social facilities and medical facilities, as well as shows suitable for people with disabilities.

Le Palais royal is an orchestra and choir that wants to create a unique concert experience unique by making its performances accessible to everyone. 

The Covéa Foundation supports the development of its “coup de foudre” concerts for young people from culturally underprivileged areas or isolated rural areas.

The concerts are held under the same conditions as in the largest venues. They include explanations from the conductor about the background of the pieces played and a Q&A session at the end of the concert.

The Clinatec endowment fund was created in 2014 to finance the innovative projects of Clinatec, Edmond J. Safra’s research centre. Doctors, technicians, researchers and biologists aim to use technology to improve the prevention, diagnosis and treatment of neurodegenerative diseases, cancer, epilepsy and severe motor disabilities.

The Clinatec research centre was created by Professor Benabid, the inventor of deep brain stimulation, a technology that stops the symptoms of Parkinson’s disease. It is unique in bringing together advances in technology, medical research and implementation in a hospital environment.

The Covéa Foundation is the main sponsor of the Clinatec endowment fund. The programmes it funds relate primarily to the effects of infrared light on two conditions:

• Neurodegenerative disorders, in particular Alzheimer’s disease;
• The after effects of head injuries.