Investing for Positive Impact: What is Needed to Scale Up

Impact investing has emerged as a significant opportunity to mobilize both public and private capital into investments that target measurable positive social, economic or environmental impact alongside financial returns. Despite the increased interest in and number of product launches claiming to be impact investments, there is no common discipline for how to manage investments for impact and the systems needed to support this. This has created complexity and confusion for investors, as well as a lack of clear distinction between impact investing and other forms of responsible investing.

To address this challenge, the International Finance Corporation (IFC), in consultation with a core group of external stakeholders—impact asset managers, asset owners, asset allocators, and development banks and financial institutions— has drafted “Investing for Impact: Operating Principles for Impact Management.” The Consultation Draft of the Principles was launched in Bali on October 12, 2018, during a high-level panel that brought together a core group of asset managers, asset owners, and policy makers who have been at the forefront of impact investing.