The Unesco Chair in Community-Based Research and Social Responsibility in Higher Education held jointly by Budd Hall at the University of Victoria, Canada, and Rajesh Tandon at PRIA in New Delhi, has published its annual report for 2024-2025. Through its DECODE project, the Chair and its partners produced six case studies “exploring how communities are…(Read more)
Category: News
Applying a Gender Lens to Infrastructure Projects
On June 15, 2025, PIDG—the Private Infrastructure Development Group owned by Australia, Canada, Sweden, Switzerland and the United Kingdom—published its new Gender Lens Investing Policy. Making the business case for investing in women in infrastructure projects, and bolstered by a clear theory of change, the new policy directs PIDG to integrate gender lens analysis into…(Read more)
Company Boards Should Focus on Substance, Not Signaling
Impact strategists Rosemary Addis and Laurie Spengler write in Forbes that, in this moment of turbulence and partisanship, corporate boards should put substance over signaling on issues of sustainability and equity. The key questions Board members should ask themselves include: “
Replicating Gender Incentives in Climate Finance
E. T. Jackson and Associates President Ted Jackson, with Teddy Samy and Katie Turner, argue in Next Billion that in uncertain times, it is essential to double down on what works. And we know that gender incentives in climate finance work. Even a small reduction in the interest rates on loans to companies building large-scale…(Read more)
Celebrating Enduring Partnerships
Late last year, Dr. Denise Beaulieu, President of Consultation M. D. Beaulieu and longstanding Senior Associate of E. T. Jackson and Associates, visited the city of Tamale in northern Ghana to seek the advice of another valued Senior Associate, Mr. Coleman Agyeyomah. One of Ghana’s most accomplished community development experts, Coleman teaches a development studies…(Read more)
$3B for Women’s Small Businesses
The Women Entrepreneurs Finance Initiative (We-Fi), a global campaign with multilateral development banks and bilateral donors to mobilize financing for women’s micro, small and medium-sized enterprises, raised USD 5.3M in 2024, exceeding by a factor of five its goal for the year, and in the process reaching 400,000 women’s MSMEs worldwide. Also in 2024, the…(Read more)
Preparing for What Comes After the Old Aid Paradigm
Georgetown University’s Professor Ken Opalo has published a blog arguing that the trend of rich countries, notably but not only the US, could be an opportunity for African countries. “Everyone must be clear-eyed about the fact that this might be the end of the long-established aid model. And it’s imperative to prepare for what comes…(Read more)
Ghana to Host 2025 Africa Impact Summit
Impact Investing Ghana (IIG) along with sister platforms in Kenya, South Africa and Nigeria, will host the 2025 Africa Impact Summit in Accra on June 11-12, 2025. The meeting will feature deal rooms to match investors and funds and companies seeking impact capital and a pre-conference study tour to Nigeria. For more information on the…(Read more)
Big Renewables Potential in Vietnam Needs Investment: New Report
A new report on renewable energy in Vietnam by researchers at Imperial College London and Singapore Management University found that “Given Vietnam’s strong resource potential, domestic and international investors have shown strong interest in various renewable energy projects, including solar, wind, and hydropower.” The Vietnamese government has instituted supportive policies to grow renewables, including feed-in…(Read more)
Global Energy Transition Investment Surpasses $2 Trillion
US-based Canary Media reports that, in 2024, global investment in the energy transition for the first time passed the $2 trillion mark. The main components of this aggregate number were $757 billion for electrified transportation, $728 billion for renewable energy projects, and $390 billion for power grids, based on Bloomberg data. To read the article,…(Read more)