Trust for Mutual Understanding
The Trust for Mutual Understanding (TMU) awards grants to American nonprofit organizations to support direct exchange in the arts and the environment (and the intersection of the two) between professionals from the United States and our geographic region of 29 countries: Albania, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Croatia, Czech Republic, Estonia, Georgia, Hungary, Kazakhstan, Kosovo, Kyrgyzstan, Latvia, Lithuania, Moldova, Mongolia, Montenegro, North Macedonia, Poland, Romania, Russia, Serbia, Slovakia, Slovenia, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Ukraine and Uzbekistan. TMU was established in 1984 by an anonymous American philanthropist as a private, grantmaking organization dedicated to promoting improved communication, closer cooperation, and greater respect between the people of the United States, the Soviet Union, and other countries in Central and Eastern Europe. TMU’s program reflects her conviction that grantmaking can contribute to this process by supporting international face-to-face contact and professional interaction. TMU continues to support professional exchanges, reflecting the founder’s appreciation of the importance of culture and ecology in people’s lives. TMU’s mission has been shaped by the belief that creative international collaboration encourages global harmony.