Investing for Impact

The stats on the advantages of women's economic empowerment need little introduction. McKinsey, for example, say that if women's participation rates were the same as men's it would add $26 trillion to global GDP by 2025. So, how can investors and businesses find these opportunities to support women's empowerment? In this podcast, we look at different examples from across the value chain - from Board level, to employees and customers. The episode features interviews with:- Tamsin Jones, co-founder, TheBoardroom Africa
- Marcia Ashong, co-founder, TheBoardroom Africa
- Ritu Kumar, Director, Environmental and Social Responsibility, CDC Group
- Shami Nissan, Head of Responsible Investment, Actis
- Rajeev Ahuja, Head of Strategy, RBL BankFind us on Twitter @CDCGroup

This is a co-produced Development Finance and CDC podcast.Two billion people are living in countries affected by fragility, conflict and violence. Fragility and conflict have a huge impact on poverty, so in these countries businesses are particularly important because of the economic and job opportunities they can create. Growing a successful company in such a country is easier said than done, however. In this podcast, we aim to understand the challenges facing people trying to build businesses in these extremely challenging environments and find out how they are overcoming them.We hear from Teza Bila, the Managing Director of Congo Invest Consulting in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), and Michael Mithika, who's leading the World Vision Fund, which covers fragile states such as the DRC and Azerbaijan. We also speak to Thierry Artaud, the Managing Director of M-Birr a mobile payment platform in Ethiopia - a country no longer classified as a fragile but one that still faces its fair share of challenges.

In our 5th CDC E&S podcast we interview Philip Powell (Director of Eco-Livelihoods) to discuss the challenges around land acquisition and livelihoods restoration in the context of development finance. During this podcast we attempt to answer some difficult questions including how to deal with land legacy issues, when can we say that livelihoods have been restored, or how to budget for a livelihoods restoration.

This is a co-produced Development Finance and CDC podcast. Over the course of this 10 minute episode, we take a closer look at organisations that many people aren't that familiar with: development finance institutions (DFIs). We hear about what DFIs do and what more they could be doing in future. We hear from Nanno Kleiterp, the Chairman of the European Development Finance Institutions, Mussa Chayenda who works for a business that has received DFI investment, and we also speak to the academic Sir Paul Collier from the International Growth Centre.

Here we meet one of the inspiring women working at one of our investee companies in Africa. Monique Gieskes has an impressive CV. She’s the regional director for the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) at textile company Vlisco, she’s on the Board of Feronia, a large agribusiness, and she’s the president of the UN Global Compact in the country. As a senior Congolese businesswoman, Monique draws on her experience to discuss the barriers to women’s economic empowerment in the country and how they can be overcome.

This is the fourth edition in a series of podcasts from CDC Environmental and Social Responsibility team. This episode focuses on the role of the board on managing environmental, social and business integrity matters. Here we interview Rosalind Kainyah and Imoni Akpofure from Kina Advisory.

More than 1.2 billion people in the world live without access to electricity. It's an issue that's holding back development. The World Bank estimates that, with reliable power, African economies could be growing up to two percentage points faster every year. The emergence of off-grid solar systems used by homes and small businesses is beginning to address the problem. These typically consist of a solar panel and battery, which powers a set of lights, a phone charger and radio. Whilst this industry has grown massively in recent years, how much further can it go and what barriers to the companies in the industry face?In this podcast we speak to three people working in the sector to answer these questions:
- Jesse Moore, CEO and Co-Founder of M-Kopa
- Laura Sundblad, who works on access to finance at GOGLA - the Global Off-Grid Lighting Assocation
- Geoff Manley, Investment Director at CDC and the person leading our off-grid solar strategy

This is the third edition in a series of podcasts from CDC Environmental and Social Responsibility team. This episode focuses on how to build Environmental and Social Management Systems (ESMS), where we discuss what good looks like and what is the value for companies of a functional ESMS in place.

This is the second edition in a series of podcasts from CDC Environmental and Social Responsibility team. This episode focuses on labor and working conditions, where we discuss what good looks like and what is the value for companies of good labor practices.

This is the first edition in a series of podcasts from our Environmental and Social Responsibility team, which focuses on how businesses can benefit from introducing high sustainability standards.Here, we speak to Mark Goldsmith – the founder of Five Oak, a sustainability consultancy – about how environmental, social and governance (ESG) has evolved over the years, where environmental and social due diligence should focus and the business case for ESG.