About the Network


Stiftung Mercator began funding programmes for young people to meet and exchange early on. The foundation helps them learn new languages, get to know new countries, develop personal skills and collaborate on subjects of special concern to the foundation. Over the years, numerous training programmes for young leaders and fellowships have been added. In addition to grantees and fellows, the foundation’s staff and partners help make our alumni network lively and convivial.


About Stiftung Mercator


Stiftung Mercator GmbH is a private, independent foundation based in the Ruhr region, the home of its founding family, the Schmidts. Global thinking, scientific precision and entrepreneurial action, the quest for intercultural understanding, healthy curiosity and openness link the foundation to its namesake, the eminent Duisburg cartographer Gerhard Mercator (1512-1594). Learn more

Through its work, Stiftung Mercator promotes equal rights and opportunities, social cohesion, respect, tolerance, cosmopolitanism, and the protection of nature and the environment. Since its founding in 1996, Stiftung Mercator has supported charitable causes and promoted people and projects related to its theme areas in a variety of ways.

At the Stiftung Mercator headquarters in Essen, its project centre in Berlin and regional offices in Istanbul and Beijing, some 110 employees develop and support foundation projects in collaboration with various partners. In addition, several partner organizations of Stiftung Mercator work independently on the foundation's thematic objectives.