What’s Gender Lens Investing?

Gender lens investing has emerged as a strong affect funding technique that mixes pursuing monetary returns with pursuing gender equality and social well-being. It acknowledges the significance of investing in girls as enterprise homeowners, as purchasers/clients, in addition to of their workforce and management roles, to foster stronger, faster-growing establishments that obtain higher monetary returns and create a extra equitable world.

At its core, gender lens investing seeks to generate constructive social affect by supporting girls’s engagement in enterprise and the financial system. This often encompasses investing in women-owned companies, or companies that supply services that enhance girls’s well-being, or companies that create job and management alternatives for girls, or all the above. By directing capital in direction of corporations and initiatives that promote gender equality, buyers can drive constructive change whereas additionally attaining monetary success.

The Energy of Gender Lens Investing

In response to 2021 information revealed by GenderSmart, sustainable or affect investing flows had been estimated at USD 40 trillion in 2021 however, of that, solely USD 17–20 billion included gender lens investing. It is a substantial missed alternative because the potential features of investing in girls’s financial engagement is properly documented. The McKinsey World Institute present in 2020 that advancing gender equality and opening financial pathways for girls might add $13 trillion to the worldwide gross home product (GDP) by 2030, furthering social and financial progress and resilience for all teams.  A report from Oliver Wyman in the identical yr estimated that monetary providers corporations are lacking at the very least a $700 billion income alternative every year by not absolutely assembly the wants of girls clients.

Analysis persistently exhibits that corporations with numerous management groups and inclusive practices outperform their friends. By investing in companies that prioritize gender equality amongst their clients and their workforces, buyers can faucet into this potential for monetary outperformance.

How does Gender Lens Investing Work?

The method of gender lens investing entails every stage of the funding cycle.  On the funding choice stage, gender lens buyers  would consider goal corporations’ gender variety in management, office insurance policies that help girls, and services or products that profit girls, reminiscent of entry to finance, schooling, or healthcare for girls and ladies. On the negotiation of phrases and situations stage, gender lens buyers would require commitments from administration round gender greatest practices and gender disaggregated reporting for accountability.  Through the holding interval, gender lens buyers would train their affect to push for such greatest practices, and construction administration incentives that reward progress towards gender parity within the workforce and buyer base. 

To measure the affect of gender lens investing, rigorous information assortment and evaluation are important. This consists of accumulating gender-disaggregated information, which supplies insights into the experiences and outcomes of girls throughout the funding portfolio. This data-driven strategy helps corporations monitor progress, establish areas for enchancment, and accumulate necessary information on which to base administration selections.  For the gender lens investor, it would exhibit the social and monetary affect of their investments.   Lastly, on the conclusion or exit of the funding, gender lens buyers would search to lock in gender features by guaranteeing new buyers will proceed to worth gender variety. 

It ought to go with out saying that gender lens buyers ought to themselves replicate gender variety of their funding groups, however thus far the funding business continues to be male-dominated with relative few girls in management positions and funding decision-making roles.  This, too, should be a magnet for gender lens buyers, particularly because the outperformance potential of gender-diverse funding groups can also be supported by analysis.

Girls’s World Banking’s Expertise with Gender Lens Investing

With WWB Capital Companions and WWB Capital Companions II funds, Girls’s World Banking Asset Administration (WAM) has invested roughly $100 million in 21 inclusive monetary establishments spanning Asia, Sub-Saharan Africa, Center East & North Africa, and Latin America. These investments have had a transformative affect, reaching roughly 8.5 million girls.  Now we have proven constructive correlations between gender variety amongst workforce and buyer bases and progress and profitability.  Now we have proven constructive correlations between girls and credit score high quality. Now we have additionally helped drive towards gender parity in common loans sizes.  

Every WWB Capital Companions II Portfolio Firm, undergoes a complete Gender Efficiency Examine, to generate and leverage data-driven insights. This evaluation delves deep into the gender dynamics throughout the firm, its operations and its shopper base, enabling the event of a personalized, strategic Gender Motion Plan. This distinctive strategy to gender lens investing is meticulously designed to drive significant change and maximize the outcomes of our investments.

Conclusion

Gender lens investing throughout the realm of affect investing harnesses the facility of capital to drive significant change. By constructing gender-diverse funding groups and strategically deploying investments in women-led companies, gender-diverse establishments, and corporations championing gender equality, buyers could make a quantifiable distinction in advancing gender equality whereas concurrently reaping monetary rewards. The rising prominence of gender lens investing signifies a strong shift in funding practices, one which embraces the interconnectedness of monetary returns and social affect. By this strategy, buyers will be catalysts for change, driving us nearer to a world the place gender equality is not only an aspiration however a tangible actuality.

This weblog was written by Girls’s World Banking Communications Intern & Hollins College Scholar Charvi Gangwani.