CHICAGO (March 9, 2023)—The Catalytic Capital Consortium (C3) is funding three new projects designed to make the catalytic capital market more efficient and effective, helping unlock more of this vital form of impact investing to address social and environmental issues.
Through C3 Grantmaking, this is the final funding from the initiative’s Fostering Solutions and Infrastructure (FSI) workstream, joining nine projects announced at the end of 2022. The projects are all designed to address barriers that create catalytic financing gaps and slow progress on climate solutions, global health, economic opportunity and social justice.
All told, 100 applicants from 16 countries applied for FSI funding—organizations that are designing new products and approaches to enhance the deployment of catalytic capital, spur action and partnerships on the ground and utilize new digital platforms to support the market’s continued growth.
“We are seeing a great deal of creativity in the marketplace on strategies to better connect investors with funds and enterprises that have the capacity to deliver transformative results for people and the planet,” said Stacy Xiao, program officer for C3. “We know by now that no one product, tool or approach will get us there on its own; but, a range of replicable strategies like those being funded through FSI can help create new approaches for others to try out in order to accelerate the flow of capital in meaningful ways and support progress on the UN Sustainable Development Goals,” she said.
The final FSI grants include:
- Coalition for Green Capital, which is establishing an “implementing entity” for the $27 billion Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund enacted in the U.S. as part of last year’s Inflation Reduction Act. This work would help to capitalize a national green bank and build a network of retail finance institutions to implement its program through investments around the country.
- NABII Zambia, which is working to establish a credit guarantee fund that can support local small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in Zambia, address the key challenges associated with SME financing and determine the extent to which the financing can be relatively quickly scaled-up.
- Total Impact Capital, which is creating an innovative vehicle to deploy impact notes that provide capital to scale high-impact enterprises serving low-income communities in emerging markets around the world.
Learn more about these projects and their proposed outcomes here.
The funding announced today complements other groups of C3 grants, including support for eight impacting investing networks around the globe, as well as 14 innovative research projects that are building the evidence base of the field. C3 Grantmaking has also funded a series of Learning Labs on the seeding, scaling and sustaining roles of catalytic capital, bringing together investors and practitioners to lay the groundwork for a stronger community of practice and more effective deployment of capital.
About C3
Launched in 2019, C3 is an investment, learning and market development initiative created and led by the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, The Rockefeller Foundation and Omidyar Network to increase the flow and impact of catalytic capital—a type of impact investment that is more patient, risk-tolerant, concessionary and flexible than conventional financing in order to achieve social and environmental impact that would not otherwise be possible.
The three partners jointly fund the $10 million C3 Grantmaking program, administered by the New Venture Fund, which focuses on engaging investors, advancing research, networking, peer learning and other field-building activities in order to increase the knowledge, awareness and use of catalytic capital around the globe. A separate C3 Investing program, overseen by MacArthur, is providing catalytic capital to innovative impact investing funds and initiatives.
Photo: Sustainable forestry in Africa to be financed through carbon credit financing vehicle to be supported by Total Impact Notes.