The Impact World This Week: 10 April 2025
Your quick guide to the most interesting news snippets about social enterprise, impact investment and mission-driven business around the world from the Pioneers Post team. This week: Ashoka’s Bill Drayton awarded ‘global treasure’ status by Skoll, how Ukraine’s social entrepreneurs defy the rockets, the least popular SDG for impact investors revealed, and more.
Myanmar: Impact Hub Yangon is supporting communities affected by the 7.7 magnitude earthquake, which struck on 28 March and killed at least 3,500 people. It is working with local businesses in the quake-affected areas to purchase essential supplies for emergency relief, providing support to victims as well as the local economy. Its long-term support plan aims to help local businesses rebuild and recover. MacKenzie King, the Impact Hub Network’s lead in Asia Pacific, wrote on the Go Fund Me page: “Impact Hub Yangon, a local social innovation hub that’s been active since 2017, is now stepping up to coordinate emergency relief. Their team – an incredible group of around a dozen dedicated people – has stayed in Myanmar through years of uncertainty and hardship. Now, they’re rallying once again to help their communities survive and rebuild.”
Global: Ashoka founder Bill Drayton has been named a ‘global treasure’ by the Skoll Foundation. Drayton joins other Global Treasure Award winners, including rock star Bono, Archbishop Desmond Tutu, former US president Jimmy Carter and activist Malala Yousafzai. Drayton is credited as being one of the pioneers of social entrepreneurship, founding Ashoka, a global network of ‘changemakers’, in 1981. Accepting the award as the Skoll World Forum concluded in Oxford, England, last week, Drayton spoke about adopting the term ‘social entrepreneur’ in the 80s. “We had to get past all those empty-eyed people who called us oxymorons,” he said.
Ukraine: “In Ukraine, social entrepreneurs are stepping into new roles – rebuilding communities, creating jobs, driving innovation – even under rocket attacks.” These were the words of Olena Kalibaba, CEO of the Ukrainian Social Venture Fund, speaking last week at a preview webinar of research which aims to demonstrate the opportunity for impact investors in Ukraine. Impact Entrepreneurship and Investment for Ukraine’s Recovery was published this week by The Possible, an alliance of organisations involved in the country’s impact economy. It points out that Ukraine requires $524bn for recovery and that social enterprises are playing a significant role in the country’s development.
UK: ‘Community-led home building’ is receiving a £20m funding boost from the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government as it invests in Resonance Community Developers, an impact fund that supports community-led projects for affordable homes or facilities. Under this approach, community groups will be able to access land and receive planning permission where commercial developers cannot. The fund’s investment will enable community groups to buy land and start the development process. The first £6m of the government’s investment is ready to deploy immediately.
USA: “Gutting USAID is a massive mistake and, frankly, a shameful loss.” Blue Haven Initiative cofounders, Liesel Pritzker Simmons and Ian Simmons, condemn US president Donald Trump’s cuts to USAID in their latest newsletter. Blue Haven Initiative is a family office focused upon impact investing. The Simmons say that they have partnered with USAID many times and that the agency played “a critical role in ameliorating health crises, stabilising regions, and shaping markets”. They add: “As diversified investors focused on long-term growth, we must oppose actions and policies that reduce competition and increase the risk of special-interest corruption.”
Global: SDG16 – peace, justice and strong institutions – is the most disregarded UN Sustainable Development Goal by impact investors, according to Phenix Capital group’s Impact Fund Universe Report. Phenix’s research is based on a database of 2,900 “returns-first” impact investors that are seeking market-rate returns on investment, or higher. Those funds have raised €701bn since 2015. Over half of those funds focus on affordable and clean energy (SDG7), but in 2024 most new funds were targeting climate action (SDG13). Biodiversity-related goals (life on land and life below water) are among the least invested SDGs. At the bottom of the table is SDG16, with only 41 funds targeting peace, justice and strong institutions, and just one was launched focusing on SDG16 in 2024 – despite being “probably one of the most important [themes] at this moment in geopolitics”, the report’s authors write.
In case you missed it
Japan: The size of the impact investing market in Japan reached ¥17.3tn (US$115.3bn) in 2024, according to the Current State and Challenges of Impact Investing in Japan – FY2024 Survey published on 31 March by GSG Impact JAPAN National Partner. That’s a 50% rise on 2023 figures, when impact investments in the country totalled ¥11.54tn.
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