Blended Finance and Impact: Delivering the 2030 Agenda in the COVID-19 era and beyond
Building on the success of its 2020 pre-COVID Private Finance for Sustainable Development (#PF4SD) Conference the OECD will mark the first anniversary of the Development Assistance Committee (DAC)’s Community of Practice on Private Finance for Sustainable Development (CoP-PFSD) with a series of discussions that will aim to answer the following critical policy topics in a COVID-19 era:
Addressing regulatory and financial capacity constraints
Institutions that deliver development finance, such as DFIs, will be required to respond to the COVID-19 crisis with constrained financial capacity: a situation where balance sheet optimisation can play an important role. This discussion will feed on insights from the Report of the Global Investors for Sustainable Development.
Closing the SDG financing gap: making the most of blended finance
Mobilising additional financial resources effectively for sustainable development requires mitigating investment risks and encouraging commercial finance providers. Blended finance instruments — such as guarantees and direct investment — have proven effective, with $205.2 billion in private capital mobilised for development over 2012-18. The OECD DAC Blended Finance Guidance provides policy makers and development finance actors with the background, evidence, best practice and tools to engage in blended finance effectively.
Driving impact: the role of frameworks and standards
Businesses and investors often point out their SDG alignment without disclosing how they contribute meaningfully to the achievement of the Goals. Public and private actors need to agree on common frameworks and standards to measure the impact of sustainable development investments, and reduce the risks of “SDG washing”.
Focusing on climate and gender to build back better
With less than 10 years to reduce global net CO2 emissions by 45% and limit global warming to 1.5C, mobilising climate finance may be the most pressing challenge of our time. Governments, institutional investors and other actors must scale up climate finance mechanisms, strategies and disclosure levels in order to ensure the COVID-19 build back is sustainable. Adopting a gender lens while implementing blended finance initiatives is also necessary for ‘smart’ finance to meet the needs and priorities of marginalised groups.
