The United Nations Capital Development Fund (UNCDF) and Artesian launched an impact partnership to support gender-lens investing, boost female leaders in the corporate workplace and support women’s economic empowerment in the world’s 47 Least Developed Countries (LDCs).
The Artesian Women’s Economic Empowerment Bond Fund (WE Fund) will invest in public companies with women in management and board positions, fair compensation and work-life balance policies including parental leave and flexible work options, and commitment to gender equality. The fund will donate one-third of the management fee to a nonprofit organization, SheSyndicate, and UNCDF, to support women’s economic empowerment around the world.
“We are proud to work with Artesian and SheSyndicate on an innovative impact partnership. Pension funds and socially-conscious investors globally are seeking ways to use their investment dollars to support the UN Sustainable Development Goals. The WE Fund offers an innovative mechanism to recognize and reward companies with accountable business practices and gender-positive management policies, while also making a donation to support UNCDF’s work in LDCs”, said UNCDF Executive Secretary, Judith Karl.
Through a fixed income strategy using Equileap’s screening and guidance, the WE Fund will seek to produce market rate returns tracking the Bloomberg Barclays Global Aggregate Corporate Index. “With the launch of our Women’s Economic Empowerment Bond Fund, we are making it easier for gender lens investors and stakeholders to support global economic equality,” said John McCartney, Managing Partner at Artesian.
This fee donation will support the UNCDF’s work in LDCs, including helping poor women access savings and credit, lending to small and mid-size businesses run by female entrepreneurs in frontier markets and supporting local governments as they build climate-resilient infrastructure and manage their public finances in transparent and accountable ways.
SheSyndicate will use its donation to fund education and mentoring programs that benefit female entrepreneurs, investors, directors, and future leaders. A portion of the funding will also be used to set up a dedicated foundation to support non-governmental organizations that help the world’s most vulnerable and marginalized women, particularly those affected by COVID-19.
Esther Pan Sloane, Head of Partnerships, Policy and Communications at UNCDF claims that this partnership shows the promise of new ways of doing business: “It’s getting more difficult for investors to differentiate between the many new vehicles aimed at supporting sustainability or achieving impact. Artesian is demonstrating its commitment by putting money on the table to support women around the world. Their donation to UNCDF will help us support a new generation of female entrepreneurs in developing countries”.
UNCDF is a UN agency with specialized expertise in making finance work for the poor in the world’s LDCs. Artesian is a global alternative investment management firm specializing in debt, venture capital and impact investment strategies.
However, Vicky Lay, SheSyndicate Founder and Artesian Head of Impact Investing, states that the global economic gender gap has complex causes and is widening each year. “It will require concerted effort, ingenuity and resources to solve. Innovative public private partnerships like the WE Fund are necessary in order to unlock impact capital at scale and drive real change.”
For Funds Society, Madrid