NextBillion - An Initiative of the William Davidson Institute at the University of Michigan

Finance is not working for people or the planet. We need to act to change this.

There is a significant gap between this growing awareness and tangible actions that will result in better outcomes. The COVID-19 pandemic has increased the annual SDG financing gap to $3.7 trillion in 2020, up from $2.5 trillion in 2019 (OECD) – a drop in the ocean compared to the claimed ESG investment universe. It is certain that in the current landscape of small, separate sustainable finance initiatives, often focused in high- and middle-income countries, we will not deliver the change at scale needed across the financial system globally. A transformational shift in how we think about capital, the role of capital in society, and the private sector is needed.

In this special fireside chat and audience Q&A, Impact Entrepreneur’s Laurie Lane-Zucker welcomes the Director of UNDP’s Sustainable Finance Hub, Marcos Neto, to discuss the innovative instruments for attracting and disbursing significantly greater amounts of impact capital and exponentially growing the business/finance sector’s social and environmental impact.

We will discuss, among other topics:

• A new normal where enterprises’ role moves from maximizing profits to maximizing economic, social, and environmental impacts or, to put it even more ambitiously, our collective human and planetary wellbeing
• Instruments that enable businesses and investors to continue to be profitable and become more equitable economic models fit for the future
• UNDP’s relationship to countries and the private sector in this journey

Time: 12:00 PM – 1:15 PM EST