The South Africa-based Bertha Foundation has partnered with the Channel 4 BRITDOC Foundation to launch two new funds for documentary features totaling £1.5 million ($2.4 million) over three years.

Available to filmmakers worldwide, the funds will go to support "passionate individuals, strong leadership and activism to create social change,"said Rebecca Lichtenfeld of Bertha Philanthropies. "The Foundation believes in the importance of documentary film and its ability to have a positive social impact. We are proud to be partnering with BRITDOC and together launching these two exciting new initiatives.”

The funds are:

The Bertha BRITDOC Documentary Journalism Fund – for filmmakers from around the world working at the intersection of film and investigative journalism. For films that break the important stories of our time, exposing injustice, bringing attention to unreported issues and cameras into regions previously unseen. £250,000 a year for 3 years is available to filmmakers as a mixture of grants and investments.

The Bertha BRITDOC Connect Fund – the first outreach and engagement fund in Europe, is open to filmmakers from around the world with smart, strategic outreach campaigns that have the ability to achieve real change on a local, regional or global level. £250,0000 a year for 3 years is available in grants. 

Steve James' The Interrupters, a film we've discussed quite a bit on this site, has won the first grant from the Connect Fund, and Soniya Kirpalani's We the People is the first project to get backing from the Documentary Journalism Fund.

For more information about the funds and to apply, visit www.britdoc.org/bertha