High-level dialogue convened in Tokyo as Japan’s G20 presidency begins

 TOKYO, 21st January 2019 — As Japan takes over the G20 presidency in 2019, the Global Steering Group for Impact Investment (GSG) with Japan’s National Advisory Board for impact investment and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) is convening a high-level dialogue to engage with the G20 Development Working Group (DWG) and other G20 representatives.

In 2018, the G20 agreed on a communique that included impact investment for the first time in its history. The world’s 20 leading nations explicitly recognized impact investment as a powerful driver of sustainable and inclusive growth:

 “We will endeavor to further create enabling conditions for resource mobilization from public, private and multilateral resources, including innovative financial mechanisms and partnerships, such as impact investment for inclusive and sustainable growth, in line with the G20 Call on Financing for Inclusive Business,” according to the communique.

As a result, GSG is stepping up to engage in Japan with a meeting in Tokyo on Wednesday 23 January 2019.

Mr Kotaro Katsuki, Director of Global Issues Cooperation at Japan’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, who is responsible for implementing the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), will welcome delegates to the meeting. The event will focus on the development of impact economies and discuss the evolution of successful impact funds as a path to implementing the SDGs.

At the 2018 G20 Buenos Aires meeting, presided over by Argentina, the impact revolution shifted up a gear. Together with our global partners, GSG advocated for impact investing to be recognized as key to a more just and prosperous future by the twenty most powerful nations in the world.

The letter GSG co-signed with Sistema B, The B Team, and B Lab, with support from the WEAll Alliance, called specifically for a G20 working group that could propose net positive impact economic policies, mechanisms and a legal framework in all G20 countries for establishing benefit corporations (B Corps). In addition, this coalition called on convening leaders of global businesses, funds and NGOs to work with G20 governments on the longer-term transition to an impact economy.

Amit Bhatia, GSG CEO, says it is essential that impact is considered alongside risk and return.

“GSG, with its 21 member countries, urges G20 to recognize impact alongside risk and return, as an essential decision criterion in all business, investment, policy and consumption decisions.

“Annual reporting should be mandatory, so that the world can truly usher in just and equitable ‘impact economies’, which address people and planet issues at scale, thus unlocking private capital for public good and fulfilment of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs),” he says.

 As part of this dialogue, the GSG and other impact investment experts and practitioners, including experts from McKinsey, OECD, UNESCAP and UNDP, will demonstrate how impact investment can support topics closely aligned with those of the DWG, such as inclusive business and SDG investment. UNESCAP and OECD will present research targeted particularly to help policy-makers support impact investment.

Media contacts

Oliver Wagg, Global PR Director, GSG: oliver.wagg@gsgii.org; +44 (0) 7885 377264

Tomomi Sekioka, Japan Social Impact Investment Foundation: pr@siif.or.jp; 080-5186-2666

Interviews available

About the Global Steering Group for Impact Investment (GSG)

The Global Steering Group for Impact Investment (www.gsgii.org)  is an independent international network catalyzing impact investment to benefit people and the planet. Established by Sir Ronald Cohen as the successor to the G8 Social Impact Investment Taskforce, the GSG currently has 21 countries plus the EU as members. The GSG brings together global leaders from the worlds of finance, business, and philanthropy to promote measurable impact as a deliberate driver in every investment and business decision.