Strategically deploying more capital to gender-smart vehicles and investments serving both women and men entrepreneurs requires action from all actors in the ecosystem. Here are some key pathways to action, identified during a recent GenderSmart and We-Fi Programme technical workshop on increasing investments in women entrepreneurs through funds and structured vehicles.

Governments and the international development community now have a once in a generation opportunity to prioritize clean energy investments in recovery plans and stimulus packages, writes Damilola Ogunbiyi, CEO and Special Representative of the UN Secretary-General for Sustainable Energy for All (SEforAll) and Co-Chair of UN-Energy.

Prejudice benefits no one. But just how harmful is it to societies worldwide? And what are the economic arguments for overcoming it? Paul Donovan, Chief Economist at UBS – and author of "Profit and Prejudice: The Luddites of the Fourth Industrial Revolution" – explains the facts and fictions of discrimination.

The modernisation of agribusiness value chains must take a gender-progressive approach, which requires a shift in the investment landscape to better integrate gender, from capitalising women-led companies to ensuring women farmers are empowered across the value chain.

Over the past six months, GenderSmart has taken to heart our commitment to racial equity and diversity, examining both our own practices and our potential to influence others. Here’s a short progress report, and some thoughts about what comes next.

Just as the crises of a lack of access to clean water and sanitation and of gender inequality compound each other, the solutions are symbiotic. Women are the key to solving the water crisis, and the co-authors of this article have come together as three voices from the philanthropic and impact investing communities to advocate for increased investment in, and representation of, women.

Diane Isenberg is the Founder of Ceniarth, a single family office focused on impact-first investments that benefit marginalised communities globally. Diane founded the office, which stewards ~$400M in impact-first capital across both fund investments and direct enterprise lending, in 2013. Ceniarth is based in London with professional staff in both the UK and the US.

In July and August 2020, WOCAN produced a podcast series – "10 Solutions for a Feminist Climate- resilient Recovery – featuring ten international thought-leaders who shared their views on how to reimagine and reshape our future from a feminist approach. These ten podcasts present concrete and bold solutions and call for urgent actions, summarised here.

Now is the time to write cheques to diverse asset managers. As we prepare for Capital Connect, a series of curated meetings between like-minded LPs and GPs, we speak to Bahiyah Yasmeen Robinson, Founding Director of VC Include and Capital Connect partner, for her insights into inclusive investing from both sides of the marketplace.

Women of colour are the fastest growing entrepreneurial demographic in the U.S., and key to an inclusive recovery, but they face considerable barriers to capital - including perceptions of risk from lenders. New findings from a multi-year research programme suggest they are not riskier borrowers, writes CNote’s Danielle M. Burns; it’s time to invest in them through CDFIs and counteract biased lending practices.

This article is part of a series from contributors to GenderSmart’s Gender and Climate Investment Working Group. For most, Gender and Climate Investing is a new field, but there is already a lot of great work underway. By showcasing powerful examples from across the investment ecosystem, Working Group contributors are using their voices in the lead up to February’s GenderSmart Investing Summit and beyond to highlight the important role a combined gender and climate lens can play in delivering a just, green economy transition.

The blue economy - sustainable activity related to the world’s oceans - is on a lot of investors’ minds right now. It’s also an arena in which women are often significantly excluded and underestimated.

We speak to Agnetha “Jaime” Gloshay and Vanessa Roanhorse, Co-Founders of Native Women Lead, an organisation dedicated to supporting and growing Native American women entrepreneurs and leaders, about Indigenous economies, the challenges facing Native women, and the importance of letting Native women lead.

Mara Harvey is the Head of Client Services, Global Wealth Management at UBS, where she founded and led a global program to better serve female clients and build the organisation’s capacity for gender-smart investment. She spoke to GenderSmart about what it takes to bring about real transformation within a large organisation, better data, and why unlocking women’s wealth is critical to the success of any financial institution.

Teresa C. Younger is the CEO and President of the Ms Foundation for Women, which is on a mission to build collective power by centering women and girls of colour. She explains how the Ms. values run through everything the Foundation does - from their investment policy statement to the make-up of the organisation, where three quarters of the leadership team and 70% of the staff are women of colour - and why institutions need to get intentional about being uncomfortable.

Marisa Drew is the Chief Sustainability Officer & Global Head Sustainability Strategy, Advisory and Finance at Credit Suisse. She draws on a 30-year career in investment banking to reflect on key learnings around organisational bias, and the role of ESG in scaling institutional capital.

We speak to Charity Wallace, Managing Director for the Global Women's Issues office, and Alec Paxton, Director in the Social Enterprise Finance Team and the first chair of the 2X Challenge, about the forging new public-private partnerships, institutional buy-in, and the importance of intentionality.

We speak to Jen Braswell, Director of Value Creation at CDC Group, about the importance of designing a gender strategy with operationalisation in mind, getting leadership and team buy-in, and maintaining momentum at a time of immense global upheaval amidst competing business priorities.

Jessica Espinoza is gender lead at Germany’s development finance institution, DEG, where she has been spearheading gender strategy across the organisation since 2018. Jessica co-leads the investment officer and tools working group at the Gender Finance Collaborative, and was recently announced as the new chair of the 2X Challenge. The following interview took place in July 2020.

Head of Content Sana Kapadia on why September’s back-to-school focus is a perfect opportunity to kickstart new conversations around investing in care.