Scaling Social & Impact Enterprises
Capitalising on Switzerland’s position as a frontrunner in supporting the impact investing ecosystem in Bangladesh, this flagship programme continues with the agenda to incentivise impact enterprises to enhance their impact creation thereby increasing their potential to scale and intensify their positive social and environmental contribution. This will be done by bridging the unmet gaps to secure appropriate non-development financing, institutionalising impact investing and setting a blueprint for regional replication.
| Country/region | Topic | Period | Budget |
|---|---|---|---|
|
Bangladesh |
Employment & economic development
Business support & economic inclusion
SME development Financial policy |
01.01.2024
- 31.10.2027 |
CHF 7’014’420
|
- incubators, accelerators and other service providers
- impact enterprises
- impact investors
- 287’356 low-income beneficiaries improved their livelihoods through supported impact enterprises
- A further 100’000 low-income beneficiaries benefited from the offerings from impact enterprises that were supported by developments inspired or enabled by the programme
- Eight local service providers providing high-quality impact measurement and management capacity building support
- 119 impact enterprises received capacity-building support (business model development, investment readiness, and impact measurement and management training)
- 16 impact enterprises received catalytic funding to grow their operations and serve additional underserved customers
- 127’627 additional low-income beneficiaries reached through capacity building and catalytic funding support
- USD12.8 million additional capital invested in impact enterprises, caused by the programme (as of December 2022)
- Generated external contributions of CHF1.5 CHF for every CHF1 spent (as of June 2022)
- Supported the Bangladesh Impact Investment Strategy & Action Plan (BIISAP) that provides a clear overview of strategic priorities for the impact investing ecosystem, capturing the views of all relevant ecosystem actors
- Foreign private sector North
- Foreign private sector South/East
- Roots of Impact and the Impact Linked Finance Fund
-
Sector according to the OECD Developement Assistance Commitiee categorisation BUSINESS & OTHER SERVICES
INDUSTRY
BANKING AND FINANCIAL SERVICES
Sub-Sector according to the OECD Developement Assistance Commitiee categorisation Business support services and institutions
Small and medium-sized enterprises (SME) development
Financial policy and administrative management
Aid Type Project and programme contribution
Technical assistance inclusive experts
Project number 7F09990
| Background | Economies around the globe are encountering instability mostly due to the inflationary pressures, macroeconomic disruptions and increased geoeconomic fragmentation. The impact on businesses is immense especially for those who have a strong social and environmental footprint since they generate less returns and are perceived as high risk. Switzerland has been working with such enterprises to generate and measure impact whilst making them investment ready to scale using innovative instruments to align social and financial returns of social enterprises such as Social Impact Incentives. In parallel, the capacity of local service providers have been enhanced as per the needs of the market whilst working with different stakeholders, including regulators, on creating a common understanding and knowledge on impact investing. Switzerland will continue to capitalise and leverage on its local and global experience with blended finance instruments to further strengthen the ecosystem and institutionalise impact investing in Bangladesh. |
| Objectives | Impact Objective: Improved access and affordability to essential products and/or services that help build stronger resiliency and positively impact livelihoods for low-income and disadvantaged individuals. |
| Target groups |
Direct beneficiaries: Indirect, but ultimate beneficiaries: |
| Medium-term outcomes |
Outcome 1: By availing tailored investment readiness and impact management support through service providers, up to 100 impact enterprises have scaled their operations and/or reinforced the impact angle in their business models to improve livelihoods for low-income and disadvantaged people, particularly women and climate-vulnerable individuals along the value chain. Outcome 2: Through access to catalytic financing, up to 12 impact enterprises have scaled their operations, resulting in stronger resilience and improved livelihoods for low-income and disadvantaged people, in particular, women and climate-vulnerable individuals, by providing them with more essential products and services. Outcome 3: Donors, impact investors and the Government promote an enabling environment for impact entrepreneurship and impact investing and improve awareness of, and access to, finance for impact enterprises through innovative blended finance instruments. |
| Results |
Expected results: Outcome 1 Outcome 2 Outcome 3 Results from previous phases: |
| Directorate/federal office responsible |
SDC |
| Project partners |
Contract partner Private sector |
| Coordination with other projects and actors | Identifying potential opportunities to engage with development actors such as the IFC and the UNCDF will continue since the programme may create a pipeline of enterprises to avail larger scale funding. Coordination with investors networks locally, regionally and globally will be pursued more actively. Synergies are envisaged with the upcoming Swiss supported programme ‘Access to Green Financing for Enterprises’. |
| Budget | Current phase Swiss budget CHF 7’014’420 Swiss disbursement to date CHF 683’945 Budget inclusive project partner CHF 15’825’255 Total project since first phase Swiss budget CHF 4’784’100 Budget inclusive project partner CHF 12’710’040 |
| Project phases | Phase 2 01.01.2024 - 31.10.2027 (Current phase) Phase 1 15.12.2018 - 31.12.2026 (Current phase) |
