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Our Communities are Ours to Own: How Calvert Foundation is empowering small U.S. investors to strengthen their local cities through impact investments
Impact investing allows us to reframe the concept of “the investor” in an inclusive way that challenges all of us to invest in the future we hope to achieve, says Calvert Foundation’s Patrick Davis. Calvert’s "Ours To Own" movement embodies that goal, allowing people to invest as little as $20 to strengthen the communities they live in and love.
- Categories
- Impact Assessment, Investing
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Nigeria’s Booming, But Can Health Care Keep Up?: Innovators across the country are designing new methods to reach more people
Nigeria now has the largest economy in Africa, but poverty levels there have remained stubbornly high and extending health care to the country’s large and diverse population is an enormous challenge. Still, innovators are designing new methods to reach more Nigerians with quality, affordable care.
- Categories
- Health Care, Impact Assessment
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What the IMF Mandate Means for the Poor: The organization says it’s focused on narrowing the income gap – but will this affect policy?
The International Monetary Fund is known for its multi-billion dollar bailouts of struggling countries, but the organization now says narrowing the income gap between the very poor and the very rich is a key tenet of its mission. How income inequality fits into aid packages is yet to be seen, says Isaac Otto, but it is beginning to enter into the equation.
- Categories
- Impact Assessment
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NexThought Monday: Expanding the Universe of Impact Investing: How international NGOs can access investor capital to increase their impact on a large scale
Impact investments started out as mostly start-up or early-stage investments in small but promising companies that aim for a measurable social impact. But what’s next? Zurich Insurance Group and Population Services International explore how impact investing could work for a larger universe of private investors and international NGOs.
- Categories
- Impact Assessment
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Making Impact Easier: How impact investing can put capital providers and seekers on the road to more investible deals
A growing number of financial institutions are embracing impact investing, but much work remains to be done to build a robust market. Impact Economy’s new report explores how major financial advisors and institutions could align their investments, build viable pipelines of investible deals, and make impact both commercially viable and socially transformative.
- Categories
- Impact Assessment
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Facilitating New Markets: Philanthropies are uniquely suited to fostering market-based solutions to poverty
Monitor Deloitte’s recently released Beyond the Pioneer report includes a call for organizations to step up as “industry facilitators” to help overcome key challenges to scaling market-based solutions to social problems. Based on its experience in India, the Michael & Susan Dell Foundation describes several ways philanthropies can play that role.
- Categories
- Impact Assessment
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Trouble Brewing in Microfinance?: Peru and Mexico’s microcredit sectors appear to be in danger of collapsing – and the market-driven model is to blame
In spite of its well-publicized struggles, the market-driven microcredit model remains a revered concept, linked to the belief that free markets and business solutions are the best solutions to poverty. But according to Milford Bateman, flaws in the market-driven model itself are responsible for grave challenges facing Peru and Mexico’s celebrated microcredit sectors.
- Categories
- Impact Assessment
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The Impact of Inclusion: CGAP report looks at recent evidence of how financial inclusion can help the poor
There’s a strong consensus that access to suitable financial services can help poor households improve their lives, while spurring economic activity. But what is the evidence for these positive impacts? CGAP tackled that topic in a recent Focus Note, and we spoke with Nina Holle, an associate microfinance analyst at CGAP, and a co-author of the report.
- Categories
- Education, Impact Assessment
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