Subject: Heading into Q4 in high spirits

Reflections on the 2X Global Summit 2024, 2X Certification launched and meet the newest CGEF grant awardees!

Dear Friend,

As we head into Q4, we are still on a high from the 2X Global Summit 2024 which wrapped up just over a week ago in Nairobi, Kenya.

This year's Summit, co-hosted by MEDA and our first held in the African continent, was everything we'd anticipated, intended and planned for. 

For three buzzing days, our members and partners came together to learn from and share with each other and to forge stronger connections to move the field of gender finance forward.

We're grateful to our members for their generosity with their knowledge and expertise and enriching the experience of the Summit, as many members led key sessions each day and many more participated as part of panel discussions. 

We’re already looking forward to next year’s Summit, which is set to be held in The Philippines, co-hosted by the Asian Development Bank.

The Summit saw a major milestone for standard setting in gender finance, as we launched 2X Certification, our independent, robust certification mechanism designed to drive higher standards in gender lens investing. Read more about it in New Private Markets, Portfolio Adviser; Impact Investor and Impact Alpha.

We were also thrilled to announce the first ever 2X Certified entities: Aavance, Beyond Capital Ventures and Verod Capital Management, certified as Best In Class and Portland Private Equity and S4S Technologies, certified as Advanced.

If you want to learn more about 2X Certification, you can sign up for ourweekly Wednesday office hours, conveniently scheduled to suit different time zones.

We capped off a month of action and progress with twin announcements about the Climate Gender Equity Fund (CGEF) during Climate Week in New York City.

Skoll Foundation has joined CGEF as the first private foundation partner of the fund, bringing the fund's size to USD 24 million.

We also announced the latest CGEF grant awardees. They are Altree Capital, The Rallying Cry and Villgro Philippines, all dynamic and inventive women-led organisations that are advancing solutions at the nexus of climate and gender. 


Read on for a selection of GLI news and insights.

In Community,

2X Global team

News from the field

Mainstreaming gender lens investing.

Mainstreaming gender lens investing. The launch of 2X Certification is Investing in Women (IW) is doing just that throughout southeast Asia,  through its Innovation Window initiative which supports fund managers ready to develop alternative financing models for women-led small businesses. IW has partnered with fund managers (2X Ignite alumni) Beacon Fund in Vietnam and ARQCapital in the Philippines as well as Terratai in Indonesia. The MasterCard Strive EU Small Business Council has added 2X Global CEO Jessica Espinoza, who together with other Council members, will mentor and work with the EU Innovation Fund winners. Sanari Capital has published its 2023 Annual Report, spotlighting the progress and impact of its portfolio of investees. Some highlights - a 115% increase in jobs, strong growth in female staff representation and black management representation. The MasterCard Foundation’s report Young Women In Africa: Agents of Economic Growth and Transformation by 2030, hones in specifically on the contribution which young African women will make to the continent’s economic growth. 

 
Gender and Climate Investing. 

Gender and Climate Investing. Ahead of the upcoming G20 Summit in Brazil, our CEO Jessica Espinoza joined with colleagues from the Asian Development Bank in co-authoring a new report which spotlights how “the gender equality agenda and the battle against climate change are interlinked.” A successful lawsuit by a group of Swiss women who argued their government had not done enough to protect them from the impacts of climate change, sent reverberations when the European Court of Human Rights ruled in their favour in April. Now, what’s next? The International Climate Finance Accelerator Luxembourg (ICFA) has officially launched its International Social Finance Accelerator (ISFA) programme, an initiative to support social impact fund managers through launch with a package of financial support and technical assistance.

 
Leadership, Culture and Policy

Leadership, Culture and Policy, JEDI. The Diversity Project Europe (DPE) and PwC Switzerland have published a first of its kind assessment of the current state of diversity, equity and inclusion (DE&I) in Europe’s asset management industry. The racialised dynamics of …eggs. White egg donors in the United States get paid up to 8X more than black egg donors, according to a study outlined in a new book, Eggonomics.

 
Data and Tools

Data and Tools. A rise in active ownership and enhanced perceptions of the value of ESG is driving increasing demand for improvements in ESG data among asset owners, according to Morningstar’s third annual global asset owner survey. Read more insights from the survey here. New from GIZ - a database of case studies on gender responsive due diligence - the tool allows users to filter by industry (e.g. garments, minerals) or by steps in the process such as embedding in policies or communicating how impacts are addressed.

 
Care Economy

Care Economy. Could the spiralling cost of childcare be a major ballot issue in the United States elections this year? This Washington Post piece goes on the ground in Nevada, which has some of the least accessible and most costly childcare in the USA. Care needs will continue to grow exponentially in coming years - how can government leaders improve social care services and infrastructure to grow a sustainable care economy? A coalition of partners has published a Global Roadmap for Action on the Care Economy (GRAC), a framework to push forward the care agenda, with key recommendations on financing, policy changes, integrating efforts between stakeholders and data and research.

 
JEDI, Power, and New Economic Systems

Resilience (GBVH, Financial Inclusion, Security). A new report out from 60 Decibels, explores the experiences, motivations and patterns of Kenyan farmers in using digital agriculture solutions, with interesting data sets on men and women’s usage patterns. Ahead of the G20 Summit, the Think Tank 20 engagement group has spotlighted the critical role of banks and financial organisations in advancing financial inclusion, particularly for Afro-descended women in Brazil. In Bangladesh, a company is pioneering a digital solution to assist rural women, faced with large scale male migration, to manage new financial and economic responsibilities.

 

Community Calendar

7-9 October

AFSIC is the largest annual Africa investment summit taking place outside of Africa, spotlighting top African investment opportunities. Details.

15 October

ICFA’s Impact Finance Forum 2024 takes place in Luxembourg and online, exploring the latest trends, challenges, and innovations in impact finance. Register here for online access.

23-24 October

Meet members of the 2X Global team in Amsterdam at the GIIN Impact Forum 2024. Details.

28-30 October

The SOCAP conference, one of the leading convenings in the impact economy, will come off in San Francisco. Look out for the 2X Global-helmed session ‘Women: The Best Climate Investment You Can Make’.


2X Global Limited, 55 Ludgate Hill, EC4M 7JW, London, United Kingdom

You may unsubscribe or change your contact details at any time.

    This is an online snapshot of a newsletter created by the owner of 2X Global Community (2X Global Limited, 55 Ludgate Hill, EC4M 7JW London, United Kingdom) and sent via GetResponse on 2024-09-30. Report abuse