Our mission
Why the Foundation exists
The Foundation's principal purpose is to promote the prevention and control of disease and ill-health in the community - particularly in communities that conventional health systems reach last, or not at all.
We are not a passive grant-making body. The work is active: rigorous validation of traditional and integrative medicine, open clinical protocols any community can use without licence or fee, and health access delivered where distance, cost or bandwidth would otherwise deny it.
We hold to One Health - human health, animal health and environmental health are one system, and treating them separately is why so much preventive medicine fails.
What we do
Program areas
Indigenous medicine research
Scientific validation of traditional healing practice - efficacy, safe dosing, and documented safety profiles - so that communities can access effective treatment without dependence on pharmaceutical patent capture.
One Health clinical research
Zoonotic disease prevention and early detection, environmental toxin burden and chronic disease, and biodiversity as a determinant of community health outcomes.
Community health access
Pilot health access programs in underserved communities, designed to be run by community health workers rather than to require a hospital.
Low-bandwidth telemedicine
Consultation and specialist referral built for rural connectivity, so that a remote community is not excluded by its bandwidth. In development.
Sovereign health records
Members grant, time-limit and revoke who may see which category of their health record. Default is deny, and every access is audited. In development.
Open clinical protocols
Protocols developed by the Foundation are published openly for use by underserved communities globally, rather than licensed.
Peru
Where the Foundation's field work is centred
Peru is the Foundation's primary field jurisdiction. The work spans Andean plant medicine research, indigenous knowledge documentation with Andean community representatives, and a community health access pilot - conducted in Spanish and Quechua, with Aymara and Ashaninka communities engaged through their own representatives.
Research partnerships with Peruvian and Australian universities are being formalised. Where an MOU is not yet signed, we describe the relationship as proposed, not as a partnership.
Other regions - including East African and Australian indigenous plant medicine research - are part of the longer program. Peru is where the Foundation is concentrating first.
Indigenous knowledge and benefit sharing
The terms we work under, before any research begins
No traditional knowledge enters the Foundation's research without the consent of the community that holds it, and no community gives up ownership by participating.
- Free, Prior and Informed Consent of Traditional Custodians, obtained before work commences.
- Nagoya Protocol compliance on access and benefit sharing.
- Joint intellectual property control between the Foundation and the source community.
- A defined share of attributable revenue directed to a Traditional Custodians treasury.
- Pre-publication community review before any academic publication.
Indigenous Health and Environmental Treasury Fund
Benefit sharing that is structural, not discretionary
Most benefit sharing in research fails at the same point: the community is thanked, and the money and the decisions stay with the institution. The Treasury Fund is built to prevent that. It is a standing treasury with its own governing Council, and the Council holds real authority over the work - not an advisory voice that can be noted and overruled.
A defined share, not a gesture
3% of attributable revenue is directed to the Traditional Custodians Treasury, with a minimum 1% general recognition. It is a standing entitlement written into how the entities operate, not an annual act of generosity.
Administered by the Council
The Treasury is administered by the Indigenous Health and Environmental Treasury Fund Council - the Indigenous body itself - rather than distributed to communities at the Foundation's discretion.
Veto over traditional knowledge
The Council holds formal veto rights over decisions affecting traditional knowledge, FPIC arrangements, and community benefit distribution. A veto stops the work; it does not trigger a negotiation.
Joint across both foundations
The Council is a joint governance body of Winay Laef Australia Foundation Ltd and Animalis aRK Foundation Ltd, so Indigenous authority is not fragmented across the health and conservation programs.
Tamper-evident decision record
Council decisions are recorded so that they cannot be quietly altered afterwards, and so that communities retain sovereignty over their own governance record. Participation does not require international travel.
Reports to both boards
The Council reports annually to both Foundation boards, and its composition is drawn from the regions the work actually touches rather than from a single jurisdiction.
Current status - stated plainly: the Council is not yet formed. Invitations to a Sovereign Lead and to Council members have been issued and acceptances are pending; LatAm, Pacific and East African representatives are still to be identified through the communities themselves. Until the Council is constituted and has met, it governs nothing, and we will not describe it as operating. The Treasury share is committed in the entities' governing documents and becomes payable as attributable revenue arises.
Governance
How the Foundation is controlled
Charity subtypes sought
Health Promotion Charity (primary) and Public Benevolent Institution, together with advancing health and advancing education purposes. Sought, not yet granted.
No director fees
The constitution prohibits director fees. Any separate employment arrangement follows the ACNC governance standards and is disclosed.
Governance firebreak
Directors with an interest in a related party do not vote on that matter, and conflicts are recorded in a standing registry.
Charitable and commercial kept apart
Commercial wellness operations sit in separate entities from the charity. Related-party dealings are conducted at arm's length and disclosed.
The WINAY token
Operational infrastructure - held and managed by the Foundation
WINAY is the unit that runs the Foundation's operational economy: wellness and resort operations, the supply chain behind them, and the marketplace through which indigenous producers and artisan communities trade on their own terms. Its purpose is use, not speculation, and it extends to the other operational needs the network develops.
WINAY is held and managed by the not-for-profit. It is not a share, not a revenue entitlement, and not an investment. It confers no claim on Foundation assets or income.
Not offered for sale. WINAY remains inert until the Foundation is authorised to operate it, and the operating jurisdiction is still being determined. There is no public sale, no listing, and no staking or reward program open on this site. Nothing on this page is financial product advice or an offer of a financial product.
Support the Foundation
How giving will work, and what we commit to before it opens
Public donations are not open yet. When they open, every donation will be routed to the treasury of a specific cause rather than into a general pool, and that treasury's spending will be itemised and publicly traceable back to the donation that funded it.
- Each cause holds its own treasury - donations are never blended across causes.
- Spending is itemised, published, and attributable to the cause it was given for.
- Treasury control is multi-signature, not held by any single individual.
- Independent verification, not self-certification.