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Press Release: Shell Foundation and FMO Collaborate to Help Achieve Clean Energy Access in Sub-Saharan Africa
Shell Foundation, a UK-registered charity, together with FMO, the Dutch entrepreneurial development bank, announces the launch of the US$120 million Energy Entrepreneurs Growth Fund (EEGF), with an initial close of US$45 million, providing catalytic financing to early to growth stage companies in Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) operating in the access to energy ecosystem.
- Categories
- Energy
- Region
- Sub-Saharan Africa
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Here’s How Countries Might Actually Reach the UN Sustainable Development Goals
Policymakers knew that aid alone would never be able to meet the financing needs of development. But the SDGs were accompanied by the optimistic “billions to trillions” vision, in which many believed that an abundance of commercially-viable SDG-related investments were ready and waiting for trillions in profitable private investment.
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Press Release: World’s First $10 Million Sanitation Development Impact Bond Launches
A groundbreaking initiative to bring safe sanitation to some of the poorest and most vulnerable households in Cambodia launches today. The Cambodia Rural Sanitation DIB is the world’s first Development Impact Bond for sanitation and aims to eradicate the high rates of open defecation in the country and accelerate the Cambodian government’s efforts to reach universal sanitation.
- Categories
- WASH
- Region
- Asia Pacific
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Press Release: VisionFund International Raises AUD20M Through Its First Bond in Australia to Help Fund Global Financial Inclusion Initiatives
Offered in Australia to eligible institutional and high net worth investors, the bond is known as a ‘Kangaroo bond’ as it is issued in Australia in Australian dollars by a non-Australian entity. The five-year bond is unsecured and unsubordinated and offers a fixed rate of five per cent per annum, paid semi-annually.
- Categories
- Entrepreneurship, Investing
- Region
- Asia Pacific
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What Will Last Mile Distribution Look Like in 2025? Six Predictions for an Emerging Sector
From water purifiers to solar lights, the impact-oriented products can’t further development goals if they can't make it to last mile customers. Emma Colenbrader and Charlie Miller of the Global Distributors Collective explain how the organization's 140 member distributors have defied tough odds to get 13 million products and counting into the hands of last mile households. They share a first-of-its-kind report that aims to better understand the markets for these products, the customers being reached – and the business models that can reach them.
- Categories
- Energy, Entrepreneurship
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Development Impact Bond Targets Sanitation in Cambodia
WASH issues are underfunded globally, according to the World Bank, which estimates that $1.7 trillion will be needed to achieve the related Sustainable Development Goal 6. Most countries need to dramatically increase spending and to meet the significant needs, people working in the WASH sector are also looking to other sources.
- Categories
- WASH
- Region
- Asia Pacific
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Five Ways the Private Sector Can Align with the Sustainable Development Goals
How can the private sector advance the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals, and what’s the best way to measure the success of these efforts? Those questions were among the topics explored at the recent Sustainability and Development Conference at the University of Michigan. Yaquta Kanchwala Fatehi and Dana Gorodetsky at the William Davidson Institute attended the event, and they share some essential insights on the private sector’s role in supporting the SDGs.
- Categories
- Agriculture, Entrepreneurship, Environment, Impact Assessment
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Viewpoint: Should the Ease of Doing Business Really Be Our Top Priority?
Once the “ease of doing business” has been naturalised, a community will forget how this ease was achieved in the first instance – what did we lose, modify, erase, corrode as a community to facilitate the making and progress of this object called “business”?
- Region
- South Asia
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