Publication database

The Centre for Impact Investing and Practices (“CIIP”), together with Accenture and Singapore Management University, developed this field report to achieve three objectives: to illustrate the on-the-ground conversations about impact investing and practices that we hope to engender; to raise awareness of the inspiring impact work that is already underway in Asia; and to convene more discussions on how we can collectively deliver more impact in Asia, for Asia. The report shares insights from in-depth interviews and discussions with investors and businesses. It features case studies on the impact journeys of regional players and puts forward preliminary ideas on how we can advance the impact ecosystem in Asia together.

The goal of this document is to provide the key principles of social investment in Asia, based on an extensive literature review and in-depth interviews with a range of experts. Mapped across the life-cycle of a project, these are broad, high-level principles that work for investments encompassing the SDGs, with specific examples from areas of healthcare, gender, livelihoods and climate in Asia. For social investors looking to incorporate the SDG Impact Standards developed by UNDP12 in their work, the principles can serve as an accessible pathway to provide direction.

IIC releases an annual “Year in Retrospect" publication that throws light on investment trends and emerging market developments across key impact sectors such as Financial Inclusion, Agriculture, Healthcare, Technology for Development and Climate-tech. Their research highlights that 2021 has proven to be a strong year for the Indian impact sector, with more than 300 impact focussed enterprises raising $7 Bn in capital. While investment activity was robust across sectors as well as the stage of development of the enterprise, several late-stage companies have raised significant amounts of capital leading to a 135% growth in overall capital raised in 2021 vis a vis 2020.

The Aspen Network of Development Entrepreneurs (ANDE) launched the Advancing Women’s Empowerment Fund (AWEF) in 2019 with support from the Visa Foundation and the United States Agency for International Development (USAID). The overall goal of AWEF-funded projects is to address the gender financing gap for women-owned small and growing businesses (SGBs) in developing economies. The first round of grantmaking, AWEF Asia, funded eight entrepreneur support organizations (ESOs) in Cambodia, Vietnam, Myanmar, the Philippines, Pakistan, and India, as well as programs serving the region as a whole. This report summarizes the lessons learned from these grants.

Through in-depth conversations with 21 successful women social entrepreneurs in Southeast Asia, this report looks at the varying pathways to success, success factors and challenges that are specific to them, and outlines recommendations for business development services to better respond to the needs of women leading early-stage social enterprises in the region. The report also includes profiles of successful women social entrepreneurs in the region.

In India, there has been a rise in the number of social enterprises and a growing interest in impact investing, as social enterprises look to expand and seek alternate means of funding. However, there is a knowledge gap among entrepreneurs and accelerators in understanding the legal landscape and managing negotiations related to impact investing in India. This report is an attempt to address a gap in the impact investing ecosystem in India, where there are numerous complex structural and legal concepts that require understanding, both for investors and entrepreneurs.

Around the globe, a wave of innovation is sweeping across the financial sector, from public equities to bonds, real estate to insurance, venture investing to small-business lending. In each of these areas, innovative players are using an ever-growing range of instruments to achieve social and environmental benefits, while producing attractive returns. This is the exciting field of sustainable finance, and it is growing fast. Nowhere is the opportunity for sustainable finance greater than in Asia, and only a sliver of this opportunity has been realized.

IB financing as an investment and policy tool is a nascent tool with a promising but inconsistent track record in generating positive financial, economic, social, and environmental returns. Given the nexus binding exclusion, poverty, inequality, and resource consumption, this report argues that IB financing matters.

The study (i) reviews the definitions and concepts of social enterprises, (ii) outlines the landscape across 10 selected countries in Asia and Latin America, (iii) discusses challenges to scaling as faced by social enterprises, and (iv) presents suggestions for development banks to extend support to social enterprises through public and private sector investments. The study categorizes social enterprises and argues that the comparative advantage of development banks is to support selected social enterprises that are commercially bankable and have the base of the pyramid (BOP) at the core of their business operations. Development banks can support these enterprises—considered as the inclusive businesses of the future—through investing in impact funds and/or public sector loans.

This report provides case studies and lessons learned from seven Asian countries in five areas of innovative financing for development. Such innovative financing for development would benefit inclusive businesses as a new source of funding.