This week, we are launching a new website designed to enhance your reading experience. As our coverage widens, we welcome your feedback and suggestions on how to continue improving our content, and the way we present it to you.
Over 20 years ago, having just started my first job in journalism, my editor asked me to write an article about the still niche but growing socially responsible investment (SRI) sector, as it was called at the time.
The article made it to the cover of the magazine, accompanied by an illustration of a barren landscape with what looked like dying trees. On closer inspection, a few healthy branches and green fields were visible in the background, perhaps representing a glimmer of hope for the future.
Unfortunately, two decades later, neither the planet nor our society seem to be in a better place. But we are undoubtedly more aware about what needs to be done to prevent further damage and, if we are lucky, reverse some past mistakes.
With hindsight, that front cover transpired to be a good representation of what the future would hold for the sustainable investment sector, which has developed from that mostly deserted landscape, with some green shoots scattered here and there, into a fully-grown forest, some might say jungle, of terminologies and approaches. From SRI to ESG, to impact investment.
The Global Impact Investment Network (GIIN) describes impact investments as those “made with the intention to generate positive, measurable social and environmental impact alongside a financial return”.
As the sector continues to grow and mature, it is now time to focus our attention on outcomes. Can impact investments deliver?
‘Time to deliver’ was the title chosen by the G7-backed Impact Taskforce for their recent report calling for urgent action to narrow the gap between rhetoric and delivery on the mobilisation of private capital, to meet the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).
“As the sector continues to grow and mature, it is now time to focus our attention on outcomes. Can impact investments deliver?”
Our new home
Building on the work of my predecessor Maaike Veen, Impact Investor’s aim is to be an independent media platform and meeting point for Europe’s impact investment sector, and all of those who participate in it.
We want to hear from companies and social enterprises providing solutions to the most pressing societal challenges, from climate change to inequality. And from the investors who back them.
We are keen to report on the progress made by policymakers and organisations as they develop the frameworks and industry standards needed to effectively measure impact.
We are interested in examining blended finance programmes in developing countries, but we also want to dig into the role of impact-driven investors in tackling poverty and inequality across Europe.
As our coverage widens, we felt it was also time for us to deliver a better reading experience to our readers, in the form of a brand-new website.
We really hope you like our new home and enjoy reading our latest editorial content.
This week, we talk to investors calling on pharmaceuticals to link executive pay to vaccine equity; we report on the challenges of ‘greening’ the logistics sector; and we examine the outlook for Europe’s growing battery production industry.
As with the impact investment sector itself, we are continuously evolving and we welcome your feedback and suggestions.
Paula Garrido, Editor
