New report is intended as roadmap for foundations to improve governance of impact | Applications open for ImpactAssets 50 2024 | Treefera raises €2m in pre-seed funding round
Esade Center for Social Impact (ESCI) has today presented a new report focusing on the importance of governance of impact from the perspective of foundations.
The Governance of Impact report, which is co-authored by ESCI’s Leonora Buckland and Lisa Hehenberger, looks at three key inter-connected governance of impact themes and challenges and sets out an actionable framework based on nine levers, intended as a roadmap for foundations to improve their governance of impact.
Based on in-depth research with six European foundations – Bertelsmann Stiftung, Fondation Daniel et Nina Carasso, King Baudouin Foundation, Laudes Foundation, Rethink Ireland, and Pontis Foundation – into how impact is governed, the report describes the governance of impact as mission-critical and “at the heart of ensuring philanthropy lives up to its promise, being accountable to those it seeks to serve, embedding reflection, learning and a ruthless mission-focus”.
An executive summary of the report is available today, with the full report to be published in early October.
Call for applications for ImpactAssets 50 2024
ImpactAssets, a US-based impact investing firm, which publishes the annual ImpactAssets 50 (IA 50) list of leading impact investment fund managers, has launched the application for its 2024 edition.
The list provides insights into impact investment fund managers across the globe, operating in a variety of impact areas and geographies as chosen by an independent review committee of industry experts and practitioners.
The list, which has been published annually since 2011, today includes a core IA 50 list, an IA 50 Emerging Impact Managers list, which spotlights newer fund managers to watch and an IA 50 Emeritus Impact Managers list, which recognises fund managers who have achieved IA 50 recognition for at least five years. Earlier this year, Impact Investor reported that 11 new European fund managers added to the 2023 edition.
Impact fund managers have until the 27 October 2023 to apply.
AI-powered data platform focused on forest data and conservation raises €2m
Treefera, an AI-powered data platform focused on forest data and conservation, has raised €2m in a pre-seed funding round led by UK investors Concept Ventures. Other investors included Twin Path Ventures, January Ventures, and Greg Lavender, CTO of Intel, as an angel investor.
The platform aims to improve the accuracy, transparency, and efficiency of the carbon offset industry, a sector predicted to reach $250bn (€234bn) by 2050, by using AI algorithms and a data repository that maps more than a trillion trees globally.
Aimed at assurers, insurers, traders and landowners, the platform operates globally, from the US, UK, EU, and Australia, using imaging and tree identification methods that it says work well in most locations. The platform, which can be integrated into client analytics environments through an API, claims it is able to deliver highly detailed insights on forests, such as tree health and carbon sequestration, and other important ‘reversal risks’, such as fire, flood and drought, that it says will improve the accuracy with which carbon credits are priced.
