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2021-12-31-accounts

Genesis Research & Education Foundation

Report and Financial Statements

Year ended 31st December 2021

Charity No.: 1081334

Contents Page
Legal & Administrative Information 3
Report of the Trustees 4
Status & Objects 4
Organisational Structure 4
Progress Report 5
Reporting Serious Incidents 8
Approval by the Trustees 8
Receipts & Payments Account 9
Statement of Assets & Liabilities 11
Report of the Independent Examiner 12

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Legal & Administrative Information

Trustees

Mr Adrian Umpleby (Chairman) Mr Stephen Alliband (Treasurer) Dr Paul Burgess (Secretary)

Advisors to the Trustees

Mr Matt Hudson Mrs Madeline Umpleby

Director

Dr David Ellis

Principal Office

Genesis Research & Education Foundation PO Box 300 London SE11 5WP

Independent Examiner

Mr Ziqi Yang Academy House 136 Hills Road Cambridge CB2 8PA

Bankers

Santander UK plc Bridle Road Bootle Merseyside L30 4GB

Solicitors

Stewardship 1 Lamb's Passage EC1Y 8AB

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Report of the Trustees for the Year Ended 31st December 2021

The Trustees present their report together with the financial statements of the Charity for the year ending 31st December 2021. This report is prepared in accordance with the Trust Deed and complies with the applicable law.

Status & Objects

Genesis Research & Education Foundation is a Charitable Trust. Its Trust Deed was dated 6th November 1998, and modified by a Supplementary Deed dated 10th June 2000. It became a Registered Charity on 29th June 2000.

The objects of the Charity are as follows:

and these objects are to be fulfilled within the United Kingdom or elsewhere in the world as the Trustees may from time to time decide.

Organisational Structure

Genesis Research & Education Foundation is governed by three Trustees, supported by two formal Advisors to the Trustees. The Trustees & Advisors receive no payment for their work, nor do any members of their families.

The Trustees mandate an executive Director who is responsible for the day to day running of the Charity. The Director in turn co-ordinates a team of key volunteers. The Charity does not employ formally salaried workers; but those working on projects are remunerated or given honoraria, the Director regularly so.

Our library, museum & laboratory facilities are divided between the two locations.

Our beneficiaries are specialist groups of research scientists & archaeologists, university students, school children, and the wider public in general.

Much of our work is in the UK; but other aspects are carried out in Europe, and the Middle & the Far East, amongst other places.

The Charity has a reserves policy, reviewed by the Trustees annually, allowing the Charity to continue operating for at least 3 months, should all funding suddenly cease, and much longer if the Charity’s substantial reserve of assets were to be progressively sold.

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Progress Report

to our library and museum collections, and also the opportunity to meet members of our team involved in primary research supported by the charity, and thereby to take part in evidencebased discussions & presentations. However, the ongoing coronavirus disease 2019 pandemic (COVID-19) has made that difficult this year, but has, nevertheless, allowed us space to make new preparations for the return of visitors, especially with work on museum specimens.

Public demonstration presentations are one of our signature activities, as inspired by the Royal Institution lectures started in the 19th century by Michael Faraday. These have needed to continue online, because of covid, where we have made use of multimedia slideshows shared via videoconferencing on Zoom. Presentations have covered aspects of cosmology, archaeoastronomy, the archaeology of Israel, and the relationship between art & archaeology. We were also able to give online presentations to private groups, including creating a virtual tour of the Mesopotamian & Levantine galleries in the British Museum.

As for many other organisations, the silver lining of the covid pandemic is that this online approach has created the opportunity for us to reach new audiences, including those living in more distant regions of the UK and abroad (in our case in Europe & Asia); and for older and infirm people to be able to join us too, as well as those just wanting to drop by and sample. Also, discussion seems to have been facilitated hereby, perhaps through a new immediacy in the connection between the speaker and individual audience members; and by the option of direct messaging in real-time. (Indeed, such discussion has often gone on quite intensively for several times the length of the formal presentations themselves.) Furthermore, working online has helped us with mentoring students and others, where ad hoc resources are more readily shared. All this is leading to a new strategy, as the pandemic gradually recedes, that of offering a hybrid approach of both online and in-person events, on into the future.

One of the most significant uses of the online approach this year was the opportunity to help sponsor and to facilitate practical support for a major international scholarly conference on Levantine archaeology, in which team members also took part. Monies have gone towards a grant for the publication of the papers from this conference too.

Work on our library has continued, as usual. This included the acquisition of some 65 additional hard-copy monographs, with books in the categories of palaeoanthropology, Levantine archaeology, and apologetics & scepticism being the most frequently purchased this time. The most expensive acquisitions were technical academic books on Palaeozoic plant fossils; the origin of symbolism in humans; and a photo-catalogue of ancient Middle Eastern coins. Subscriptions were maintained to some 15 leading current journals, from across the fields of science & archaeology, and also in some cases their interface with various theological viewpoints.

Our museum collection has been expanded with some 680 new objects, mostly fossils and some modern biological specimens; several objects of archaeological origin; and a number of casts, replicas & models. These specimens are for demonstration purposes, as identification standards, and some are for use in research.

Geological specimens included a wide-ranging collection of impact crater breccias from across the world, with their relevance to understanding events contributing to the extinction of the dinosaurs. Also, sulphur balls from the Dead Sea area, and copper ore from the ancient mines at Eilat, with their relevance to Levantine archaeology.

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William Buckland’s original Megalosaurus jaw, the first non-avian dinosaur to be validly named; also, of hominoid jaws and skulls, including a first generation cast of Australopithecus africanus (“Mrs Ples”), and a 3D print of Homo naledi . Diverse fossils of the British Chalk, London Clay, and Crag deposits provided typological specimens from these sections for our Geological Column Project . A specimen of the fossil lobe-finned fish Eusthenopteron is of special interest for discussions about the origin of tetrapods. Biological specimens included population samples of three polymorphic species of marine gastropods used in the costly production of the ancient dye Royal Purple, which was employed in making attire for emperors and kings. Archaeological objects, mostly from Israel under Antiquities Authority license, included a sample of partially divided hacksilber – currency used before coins; first century AD coins of Herod the Great, Pontius Pilate, Festus & Aretas IV, providing authentications of those individuals; and a range of terracotta ware, including a decanter, bowl, juglets, pilgrim flask & a torch to illustrate life in those same times. Quality manuscript facsimiles of the Codex Vaticanus and the Codex Alexandrinus have aided study.

For the antiquities (of greatest concern, because of the especially fragile nature of the archaeological record), objects were from museum deaccessions, old private collections, certified dealers & regulated professional auctions, with licences as appropriate.

Much curation work has been carried out on this Museum collection throughout the year. Indeed, as custodians of these treasures for future generations, it is our honoured responsibility to track & record the provenance of each object carefully; to ensure it is properly curated; and to make objects readily accessible for visitors & available for loan to other institutions.

With regard to research, in addition to writing and to work on the literature, fieldwork this year was somewhat more confined, because of the pandemic, to expeditions in the south and east of England. In the field of geology, the Weald in Surrey, and the Crag deposits in Suffolk were studied and sampled. In the field of evolutionary genetics, we continued to support a long-term project on the brightly coloured western European Grove Snail, Cepaea nemoralis , in the central Pyrenees, although fieldwork there was not possible this year. Instead, research work was carried out on cryptic versus aposematic colouration in caterpillars of the Cinnabar Moth ( Tyria jacobaeae ), and in the adults of the Six-Spotted Burnet Moth ( Zygaena filipendulae ), both as found on the chalklands of the South Downs in Sussex. In these species, which are distasteful to birds, it was discovered that individuals are camouflaged against the flowers of the plant species they eat /choose to rest upon in the evenings, when viewed from a distance, but display warning colouration at close quarters – a fascinating dual protection against visual predators, where the same colouration is used both to hide and to startle. This raises the remarkable possibility that, beyond the use of colouration in thermal regulation and camouflage, the black & yellow banding pattern of many Cepaea shells may act similarly, with the patterning reminding predators of the warning colouration of wasps and bees, (or even locally Cinnabar caterpillars), in a superstimulus, Batesian mimicry effect.

Work continued supporting the Egypt in Israel Project too, although again it was not possible to have a formal archaeological field season in Jerusalem this summer.

New items of equipment were acquired in the course of the work, the most important being a powerful iMac, as part of an upgrade to our collection of computer hardware. Amongst many other things, this machine has helped in the preparation of videos, and in hosting online work reliably. Further lighting and green screen equipment has allowed us to broadcast from more than one locality. Quantities of storage trays of various types, as well as transport boxes, have aided in the curation of museum objects and of journal issues.

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further afield; and for books and fossil samples that were given away for educational purposes. A team member was also sponsored to attend a technical symposium on radiocarbon dating.

More generally, we've continued to network & collaborate with individuals, projects, universities, museums, and similar charitable organisations worldwide. This year we've particularly worked with, or supported, those in other parts of the UK, Germany, Italy, USA, Bolivia, Israel & the Far East.

As always, a central aim has been to place into the hands of the public, as objectively as possible, primary evidence relating to diverse questions from across the field of Origins, in order that people might come to their own conclusions, through being fully and accurately informed. These matters are important since they contribute to the foundational philosophies of human society. Once again, many have benefited over the last year, including beyond intellectual knowledge alone, some even in life-changing ways.

The Trustees are therefore glad to confirm that all of our activities have been directed towards public advantage, and that neither they, nor their families, have gained any material benefit.

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Reporting Serious Incidents

The Charity Commission requires that the trustees of a charity with annual income greater than £ 25 000 report serious incidents. The Trustees understand "serious incidents" to include the following:

The Trustees hereby report no such incidents.

Report Approval

Report approved by the Trustees, 22nd October 2022.

Signed on behalf of the Trustees:

Adrian P. Umpleby Chairman

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Receipts & Payments Account for year ended 31st December 2021

RECEIPTS £ £
Income Receipts
From voluntary sources:
Donations – individuals 21 913
Donations – organisations 2 017
Gift Aid 3 230
Conference fees 2 118
Miscellaneous:
Unprocessed donation 325 29 603
_
TOTAL RECEIPTS 29 603
PAYMENTS £ £
Charitable activity direct expenditure
Equipment:
Office, museum, laboratory & general 1 440
General consumables 50
Fieldwork 81
Mobile 141
Computer hardware 2 649
Computer software 740
Computer consumables (incl. ISP fees) 1 125
Specimens:
Biological, geological, palaeontological
& archaeological 9 081
Media:
Books, journals & maps (incl. e-books) 3 109
Audio (CD/SFX), video (DVD) & slides 17
Photographic library (digital) 132
Information (education & research):
Stationery 257
Postage & packaging 119
Telephone & communications 703
Conference fees 107
Support:
Membership & subscriptions 126
Donations & honoraria 2 903
Research grants 1 500
Environment (carbon offset) 155
Miscellaneous:
Unprocessed donation 325 24 760

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Other payments
Vehicle costs 2 014
Insurances 556
Licences & miscellaneous fees 255
Training 129 2 954
_
TOTAL PAYMENTS 27 714
Net receipts for the year 1 889
Bank Current Account & Cash Balance as at 31st December 2020 1 832
_
Bank Current Account & Cash Balance as at 31st December 2021 3 721

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Statement of Assets & Liabilities as at 31st December 2021

(numbers in brackets are from 2020 statement)

£ £
Monetary Assets
Bank Account (1 832) 3 721
Cash Tin (0)
0
SUB-TOTAL (1 832) 3 721
Other Assets
Furniture
Office, library, museum & laboratory (180)
160
Equipment
Office, museum, laboratory & general (2 150) 2 950
Electrical (1 500) 1 200
Fieldwork (1 050)
900
Audio, photographic, video, film & art (1 150)
900
Computer hardware & software (1 000) 4 050 10 000
Specimens
Biological, geological, palaeontological
& archaeological (60 950)68 200
Media
Books, journals & maps (10 150) 10 700
Audio tapes & CDs, slides, videos & DVDs (800)
650		 11 350
Transport
Vehicles (700)
700
_
TOTAL (81 462) 94 131
Liabilities
_
TOTAL (0) 0
_
NET ASSETS (81 462) 94 131

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Independent Examiner's Report to the Trustees of Genesis Research & Education Foundation

I report to the trustees on my examination of the accounts of Genesis Research & Education Foundation (the Charity) for the year ended 31 December 2021.

Responsibilities and Basis of Report

The Charity’s Trustees are responsible for the preparation of the accounts in accordance with the requirements of the Charities Act 2011 (CA2011). The Charity’s Trustees consider that an audit is not required for the year ended 31 December 2021 under section 144(2) of the CA2011. I report in respect of my examination of the Trust’s accounts carried out under section 145 of the CA2011 and in carrying out my examination I have followed all the applicable Directions given by the Charity Commission under section 145(5)(b) of the Act.

Independent Examiner's Statement

I have completed my examination. I confirm that no material matters have come to my attention in connection with the examination giving me cause to believe that in any material respect:

  1. accounting records were not kept in respect of the Trust as required by section 130 of the Act;

or

  1. the accounts do not accord with those records.

I have no concerns and have come across no other matters in connection with the examination to which attention should be drawn in this report in order to enable a proper understanding of the accounts to be reached.

Name:

Mr Ziqi Yang ACA

Relevant professional qualification or membership of professional bodies (if any):

Chartered Accountant with Audit Qualification Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales (Member No. 2981257) Address: Academy House, 136 Hills Road, Cambridge, CB2 8PA Date: 23rd October 2022 Signed:

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