The Global Innovation Lab for Climate Finance

We are thrilled to celebrate Climate Policy Initiative's new office in Cape Town, a game-changer for our East and Southern Africa regional program. This local presence strengthens our ability to support impactful climate finance solutions across the continent.

Climate Policy Initiative's Vikram Widge joined a webinar hosted by 2021 Lab proponent Energy Peace Partners and Sustainable Energy for All (SEforALL) on the nexus of climate, ESG, energy access, and state fragility. "Presently, the private sector represents a much smaller share of investment in the sub-Saharan Africa context than elsewhere,” said Widge. “We must create stronger incentives for companies and private investors to contribute to this finance gap overall, but especially to expand the level and share of private sector financing in fragile states where there is tremendous need and significant opportunities.” Check out the webinar readout: https://lnkd.in/eAX5mHPK

🎙 Prof. Dr. Martin R. Stuchtey who is behind 2024 Lab instrument The Landbanking Group broke down his visionary theory of change at a recent TEDxBerlin talk. 👉  Check it out: https://lnkd.in/eBEsheAC

📰 The Catalyst Fund's Maelis Carraro was featured in a recent Associate Press article on the funding gap for African climate startups! “We’re not gonna go far enough with just the public funding,” she said. “We need the private sector and the public sector to work together to unlock more financing. And in particular looking beyond just a few industries where the innovation is writ large.” ✅ The Catalyst Fund's instrument was endorsed by the Lab in 2023. https://lnkd.in/eDQg466r

🤝  CrossBoundary Group's Fund for Nature has teamed up with Imperative to launch a new facility to finance early-stage carbon project development activities. 🏞️ The facility is designed to catalyze investable, large-scale nature-based carbon projects in critical ecosystems across emerging markets. 🌳 Its first project will feature a large-scale reforestation and revegetation project in Sub-Saharan Africa covering up to 100,000 hectares of badly degraded land. https://lnkd.in/etCYdW2u

💯 We are proud to announce that we have surpassed 100 regional and global Lab members! 🧪 The Lab’s membership has skyrocketed nearly fourfold in 10 years, from 29 organizations at the inaugural in 2014 to 110 global and regional members today.  This growth follows the Lab’s successful launch of regional programs in the Philippines and Latin America and the Caribbean. 👉  Learn more: https://lnkd.in/e9JiK_8E

The Lab-endorsed Catalyst Fund has announced a USD 200,000 investment in MazaoHub. Supported by the Agrifood Investment Connector (Connector) of the ClimateShot Investor Coalition (CLIC), MazaoHub is now looking to raise a USD 1.5 million seed round to expand its reach to farmers by manufacturing and distributing more low-cost soil testing kits. Learn more: https://lnkd.in/e4-KK_8u

🎙️ We recently had the pleasure to speak with Grace Fenton Olatunji, Chief of Staff at Nithio. 🌍 Grace is part of the team behind Data-Driven Energy Access for Africa, a 2021 Lab instrument that standardizes metrics related to customer repayment risk, improving access to capital for distributors and efficient intermediation of credit and grants to better serve customers. 👉 Check out the interview: https://lnkd.in/eyk27B-g

🌉🌎 As part of #SFClimateWeek, Business Council on Climate Change (BC3), Salesforce, and CPI brought together corporate #climatefinance pros to discuss their climate journeys and the Corporate Climate Finance Playbook. CPI’s Ben Broché was joined by Ting L. Lee from Atlassian, Elias Habbar-Baylac from Cisco, and Ashley Monson from Salesforce for a lively discussion on leveraging the corporate capital stack to accelerate climate and #sustainability goals. LOTS of lessons learned but key takeaways include: You can’t achieve corporate climate goals just by asking for money.  It requires building bridges within and outside the company, and making the business case. Within the company, find leaders in key functions, including tax, treasury, legal, and procurement, and bring them together to create a climate finance strategy that can scale. Outside the company, there is a broad range of important stakeholders to engage, including governments for policy and investment, research, civil society, and of course customers and suppliers. It doesn’t require starting from scratch. There are existing tools and capital available to be deployed sustainability and for climate impact, but it requires being practical and determining how best to engage and deploy those existing resources. #BlendedFinance is being leveraged in new and interesting ways, including within companies, eg, #CorporatePhilanthropy working with #CorporateVC to help build and de-risk pipeline. And everywhere, don’t forget that climate is ultimately about people. Take a human-centered lens to this work and you can create stronger engagement and more impact with employees, customers, suppliers, and communities. Learn more: Join the Business Council on Climate Change: https://www.bc3sfbay.org/ Read the "Corporate Climate Finance Playbook": https://lnkd.in/gSBKpEwK Learn more about Cisco's Climate Grants and Investments program: https://lnkd.in/g3PVTV9Z Read Atlassian’s inspiring sustainability program guide, "Don’t #@!% the Planet": https://lnkd.in/eEm29-Ns

🤝 The 2022 Lab Instrument Fund for Nature has announced it has teamed with Concordia at the 2024 Americas Summit in Miami. 🌳 Developed by CrossBoundary Group, the Fund for Nature is a first-of-its-kind fund for nature-based carbon projects. https://lnkd.in/eUe2GSMx