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OPIC Commits $20 Million Loan for WaterEquity’s Social Impact Investment Fund
Press release: WaterEquity, an innovation of Water.org, today announced it has received a commitment for a $20 million loan from the Overseas Private Investment Corporation. OPIC, a self-sustaining U.S. government agency that helps American businesses invest in emerging markets, is supporting WaterEquity’s WaterCredit Investment Fund 3 (WCIF3), a $50 million social impact investment Fund that will invest in enterprises serving water and sanitation needs among the world’s poor.
- Categories
- Environment, Impact Assessment
- Region
- South Asia
- Tags
- impact investing
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The 7 Trillion Dollar Question: Can Sustainable Financial Products Close the SDG Financing Gap?
Val Smith of Citi gives global context to what sound like the impossibly high costs of reaching the Sustainable Development Goals on clean energy and global warming, saying there is good news behind the daunting gap. The challenge is that current investment levels in development and climate-positive activity remain far below what is required – but current trends in innovative finance are heartening.
- Categories
- Energy, Environment, Investing
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MetLife Named to the 2017 Dow Jones Sustainability Index
MetLife was eligible for the DJSI North America, which recognizes a group of the top 20 percent of sustainability performers across the 600 largest U.S. and Canadian companies. MetLife was one of only seven insurers in North America to make the list.
- Categories
- Environment, Investing
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Powering Communities Through a Surprising Source of Renewable Energy: Human Waste
Around the world, a staggering 2.5 billion people lack access to decent toilets. That leads to far too many people getting sick from preventable diseases. Anne Healy and Erin Crossett of Development Innovation Ventures say the good news is that some enterprising companies are experimenting with ways to make human waste disposal profitable in the developing world.
- Categories
- Energy, Environment, Health Care, WASH
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Can Satellites Solve the Farmer Suicide Crisis in India?
Researchers from the University of California, Berkley, have found a strong correlation between rising temperatures and the rate of suicides, with an increase of 1 Celsius associated with an average of about 70 additional suicides per day. Droughts have ravaged the country’s crop yields, sharply reducing farmers’ income across the sector and disrupting the predictability of revenue.
- Categories
- Agriculture, Environment, Technology
- Region
- South Asia
- Tags
- agtech, climate change
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Why Startup Accelerators Won’t Create the Global Climate Technology Revolution
Accelerators may be a great way to launch the next Pokémon Go app or even Airbnb, but they're not as suited for climate startups in low- and middle-income countries. Jean-Louis Racine, leader of the infoDev Climate Technology Program at the World Bank Group, explores several reasons why accelerators are "at best an incomplete tool for building climate tech sectors."
- Categories
- Agriculture, Energy, Environment, Social Enterprise, Technology
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Philippines, World Bank launch $206M disaster risk insurance program
In a statement, the World Bank said the new catastrophe risk insurance program launched by the Philippine government will cover national government assets affected by earthquakes and typhoons as well as losses from major typhoons of 25 provinces.
- Categories
- Environment
- Region
- Asia Pacific
- Tags
- climate change, insurance
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Five Key Building Blocks for Sustainable, Inclusive Recycling Systems
For the past year, a working group formed by the MIT Practical Impact Alliance (an MIT D-Lab program) has been exploring strategies for developing effective inclusive recycling systems in India, Africa and Latin America. The result is the publication of a guide for practitioners that includes five key steps for developing inclusive systems, nine case studies and a tool for promoting recycling systems that benefit all stakeholders.
- Categories
- Environment, Social Enterprise, WASH
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