Coutts, the private bank and wealth manager, has launched the Coutts Foundation to tackle poverty worldwide.

 Coutts, the private bank and wealth manager, has launched the Coutts Foundation to tackle poverty worldwide.

Focusing on vulnerable communities, the foundation will award grants to organisations that deliver sustainable approaches to ensure basic human needs are met. It has already moved to support projects in China and the UK.

Rory Tapner, chief executive of Coutts and also chairman of the Coutts Foundation, said they will build upon their long tradition of supporting communities, in time for the 200th birth anniversary of Victorian philanthropist and granddaughter of Thomas Coutts, Angela Burdett-Coutts.

The Foundation has approved four grants since its induction including an apprenticeship scheme for disadvantaged young people in the UK, and Lien AID’s ‘Gift of Water for Floating Communities’ in China, which creates community ownership for clean water access. It has also backed a project in India.

“The new Coutts Foundation will extend our charitable support across all our international markets - reinforcing our core philosophy of giving to alleviate poverty,” said Tapner.

Working with organisations that are already delivering energy, food, water, housing, and access to education or health care, the Foundation notes that building "resilience" within vulnerable communities will be a force against the challenges of poverty.