2021 Annual Report
In 2021, the first steps of the economic recovery looked very differently depending on where in the world you were, and progress made to reduce poverty and support sustainable and inclusive economic growth in our target regions was at risk. We once again responded by doubling our investments and finding innovative ways to generate lasting impacts through the private sector in Sub-Saharan Africa, Latin America and the Caribbean.
We are proud to see the evolution of the organization in the past few years, and we are looking forward to further growth with purpose, in the coming years, to maximize FinDev Canada’s contribution to a more sustainable and inclusive world.
I am very proud of all the work we have done this year to increase access to capital for the private sector to grow the economies of Sub-Saharan Africa, Latin America and the Caribbean.
New leadership and organizational growth
In June of 2021, FinDev Canada’s Board of Directors appointed Lori Kerr as CEO of the institution. Lori is a widely experienced development finance specialist with more than two decades of leadership in international development, and with a specialization in sustainable infrastructure, climate change, and private investment in emerging and developing markets. The year was also one of growth; we ended 2021 with a team of over 50, committed to supporting the private sector to accelerate inclusive and sustainable economic growth in emerging and developing markets.
Portfolio growth
In 2021, FinDev Canada continued to grow its portfolio to contribute to economic recovery in developing countries, doubling its level of financing to and investments in companies and financial intermediaries that advance women’s economic empowerment, climate action and local market development.
Climate action
In November of 2021, FinDev Canada launched its Climate Change Strategy at COP26 in Glasgow as part of the Canadian delegation. The Strategy describes how we will promote climate mitigation, adaptation and resilience through our investments and our operations, with ambitious actions and targets to continue building a low-carbon portfolio that is gender-responsive.
Gender action
FinDev Canada continued to implement its Gender Equality Strategy in 2021, deploying capital to drive impact on women’s economic empowerment and supporting the private sector in enhancing gender inclusion and diversity practices. We also advanced gender action through our Technical Assistance Facility, such as by launching the 2X Fund Manager Training for investment professionals and fund managers to better equip them to apply a gender lens to their investments.
Partnership with the Government of Canada
FinDev Canada launched 2X Canada – Inclusive Economic Recovery, a CAD 75.9 million blended finance facility funded by the Government of Canada through Global Affairs Canada, to contribute to the socio-economic wellbeing of underserved populations, particularly women, in its target regions. In December 2021, 2X Canada closed its first transaction with the Energy Entrepreneurs Growth Fund (EEGF), which seeks to increase access to clean energy in Sub-Saharan Africa by providing flexible financing solutions to early- and growth-stage energy companies. 2X Canada’s investment and technical assistance support will help address the unique needs of women as consumers, entrepreneurs, and employees in the access to energy sector.
Best-in-class impact management
FinDev Canada is a founding signatory to the Operating Principles for Impact Management (the Impact Principles), the international standard for impact management.
We disclose annually our alignment with the Impact Principles.
In 2021, BlueMark, a Tideline company and a leading provider of impact verification services, performed an independent verification of our Disclosure Statement, in line with Impact Principle 9. The results helped to validate our approach to impact and environmental, social and governance (ESG) management and benchmarked us against other impact investors. FinDev Canada was rated in the top tier on Principle 2 (Manage strategic impact on a portfolio basis) and Principle 5 (Assess, address, monitor and manage ESG risks) – a testament to our commitment to rigorously implement our Development Impact Framework and Environmental and Social Policy.
Since the time of the COVID-19 outbreak, FinDev Canada has prioritized transactions with financial intermediaries to help meet the growing liquidity needs of businesses, with particular attention to supporting women, who are among those most affected by the pandemic. In 2021 alone, 100% of transactions falling under our COVID-19 response have qualified for the 2X Challenge, meaning they actively contribute to advancing women’s economic empowerment.
Lending to financial institutions has always been a core part of our investment strategy, with a view to contributing to building a robust and efficient financial sector in developing countries that enables businesses to grow, attract investments and innovate.
To respond to the acute liquidity needs faced by businesses in our priority markets, we significantly increased our lending to financial institutions, with a particular focus on enabling them to cater to underserved segments, in order to advance gender and climate finance.
Nearly all of FinDev Canada’s COVID-19 response transactions that were approved in 2021 focus on micro, small and medium enterprises (MSMEs), which are the main contributors to job creation in our target regions and yet struggle to obtain the financing they need to grow. In addition, our financial intermediaries set specific targets to further benefit women-owned/led enterprises. These efforts unlocked over USD 40 million to historically underserved women-owned and led businesses at the time when they needed it most.
Loans to Banco Promerica Costa Rica and Produbanco, both part of Promerica Financial Corporation, represent examples of COVID-19 response transactions that incorporated strong gender and climate lenses. Both banks are signatories to the Principles for Responsible Banking and have committed to achieve net-zero status by 2050 (as members of the Net-Zero Banking Alliance convened by the UN).
FinDev Canada recognizes and values the important role that financial co-operatives play in the inclusive finance sector, contributing to promoting entrepreneurship, women’s economic empowerment, agriculture development, and food security. We are proud to partner with an increasing number of leading financial co-operatives in Latin America with long-standing experience in expanding access to financial services to underserved segments.
One of FinDev Canada’s digital objectives since inception has been to build an operational model that supports customer centricity and an agility culture for our team. The challenge of the health crisis and the rapid switch to virtual work presented an opportunity to fast-track change and implement our vision in a truly agile way.
Among the many improvements implemented in 2021, our team enjoys a more seamless digital-first experience to make online work more efficient, receives security upgrades and training to ensure proper information management, and has access to enhanced technical support for virtual and hybrid work.
As our organization is maturing, it is becoming increasingly important that we continue building our core organizational competencies. In 2021, we increased our internal capabilities for managing non-financial risks, specifically in the areas of environmental and social risks, as well as business integrity. Previously managed by our parent company, Export Development Canada, these critical functions are now fully embedded into our organization, enabling FinDev Canada to better respond to market and customer needs, as well as aligning with peer institutions.
In 2021, our team’s commitment and agility, as well as our close collaboration with partners and clients, allowed us to double the size of our portfolio through financing and investments in businesses that can generate lasting impacts in our markets.
Our investments focused on supporting an effective, inclusive and sustainable financial sector in the markets we serve, strengthening food security and green growth through agribusiness and sustainable forestry, advancing innovation in development finance to scale up access to clean energy, and reducing currency risks in developing and frontier markets.
As of December 31, 2021
All figures stated in USD
1 Based on active commitments. Total commitments since inception, including repayments or exits, are USD 489M.
2 The Official Development Assistance (ODA) classification is based on the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) Development Assistance Committee (DAC) List of ODA Recipients. The list groups countries, according to their gross national income (GNI per capita in current USD) following the World Bank's income classification as "low-income economies", "lower-middle-income economies", and "upper-middle-income economies", while taking into account the United Nations (UN) classification of some countries as "Least Developed Countries" (LDCs). For details see: DAC List of ODA Recipients for reporting 2021 flows June 2021.xlsx (oecd.org)
3 2X-qualified capital represents 66% of our total commitments to-date, totaling USD 315M across 23 clients. Given a considerable portion of financial institutions and funds in our portfolio, our clients typically qualified on several 2X criteria (among most common ones being leadership, employment and indirect criteria for financial intermediaries).
In 2021, FinDev Canada increased its support to Central America and the Caribbean through a series of investments focused on supporting MSMEs and building economic resilience, improving women’s access to finance, and promoting green growth.
MFX Solutions is a company that supports impact investing in emerging and developing markets through affordable hedging products and risk management education. Established in 2009, MFX gives impact investors the ability to protect themselves against the risk of currency movement. Its growing client base of impact investors operates in sectors such as renewable energy, agriculture, MSMEs and housing.
2X Canada is a CAD 75.9 million blended finance facility that contributes to the socio-economic wellbeing of underserved populations, particularly women, in Latin America and the Caribbean, and Sub-Saharan Africa.
Administered by FinDev Canada and funded by the Government of Canada through Global Affairs Canada, 2X Canada supports investments that drive positive impact on women’s economic empowerment – women as entrepreneurs, leaders, employees and economic agents. As the name indicates, all facility investments will qualify for the 2X Challenge.
FinDev Canada’s Technical Assistance Facility entered its second year of operations in 2021, during which it significantly expanded its portfolio of projects, both in terms of number and scope. Ten projects were approved by the Technical Assistance Committee, for a total commitment of CAD 860,823. Seven of these are client-facing projects and were developed with guidance from the Facility’s “Gender Action Menu,” which includes a range of interventions that the Facility can offer to clients depending on their priorities, to support them in achieving their impact potential on women’s economic empowerment.
In 2021, FinDev Canada launched its Climate Change Strategy, which articulates how its Climate Change Policy is implemented across the organization’s activities, structured around three strategic considerations:
We know that applying a gender lens to climate finance is both possible and important in advancing sustainable economic growth.
We apply a gender lens to the entirety of our climate finance portfolio, conducting gender assessments and collaborating closely with our clients to identify opportunities to enhance gender inclusion and diversity practices. Driving greater inclusion is not just good for women’s economic empowerment – it also constitutes an asset for growth-oriented businesses, being correlated with sound business management and better performance.
In 2021, FinDev Canada joined the Partnership for Carbon Accounting Financials (PCAF), a collaboration between financial institutions worldwide that enables them to assess and disclose the greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions of their loans and investments. Membership includes more than 100 banks, asset owners and asset managers, representing over USD 23 trillion in assets under management. As part of our membership, we commit to measure and disclose the GHG emissions associated with our loans and investments.
As Canada’s bilateral development finance institution, FinDev Canada is the Government of Canada’s direct conduit to the private sector in emerging and developing markets. We amplify the visibility of Canada’s development finance efforts by directing and structuring the use of financial resources, including concessional finance, in an innovative manner that is competitive with peer international financial institutions.
2X Canada is a good example of effective collaboration to deliver on Canadian international development priorities and widen the reach of Canada’s development finance impact. By complementing our core capital, the 2X Canada concessional capital enhances our ability to deliver high-impact outcomes through private sector investments that actively promote gender equality and women’s economic empowerment and address market gaps for a sustainable, resilient and inclusive recovery.
FinDev Canada is proud to contribute to strengthening the Canadian ecosystem of impact investing and development finance. In 2021, we supported the design and launch of the CAFIID Gender Lens Investing Community of Practice, to provide a peer learning system for gender-lens investing practitioners and support the development of the gender finance ecosystem in Canada.
FinDev Canada supported the development of the CAFIID 2021 State of the Sector Report, released on December 1 in both English and French – in English at the MaRS Climate Impact 2021 conference, and in French in partnership with Finance Montréal. CAFIID’s report tracks the scale, trends and outlook for Canadian impact investing in developing and emerging economies, and lays out the challenges and opportunities for mobilizing the capital needed to meet the SDGs and the goals of the Paris Agreement.
EDFI is the association of European DFIs and an important hub for collaboration, intelligence sharing and policy engagement on issues of common interest to the industry. FinDev Canada participates in several EDFI working groups, and collaborates on strategic issues. We continue to solidify our relationship with EDFI members, and US DFC, establishing periodic touch points, identifying priority issues for common work and removing obstacles to open and mutually beneficial collaboration.
At FinDev Canada, we want to lead by example when it comes to inclusion, diversity and equity (ID&E), and to become an employer of choice.
FinDev Canada launched its inaugural ID&E Committee to promote an organizational culture of inclusion, diversity and equity, and to empower staff with resources and tools to deepen their understanding and application of key ID&E concepts. The Committee, sponsored by Senior Leadership and comprising employees from different teams, backgrounds and experiences, organizes engaging and powerful events, presentations and activities, and has focused on topics such as Indigenous Peoples and Canada, Pride, Microaggressions, and Black History Month.
EDC and FinDev Canada received a Gold Certification as a result of the gender assessment conducted by Women in Governance in 2021. This reflects the organizations’ commitment to women’s economic empowerment, as well as the calibre of their gender practices, strategies, policies and programs. More details about the certification process can be found here.
I hope you’ve had a chance to learn about some of our achievements in 2021.
They’ve put us on a solid path forward – as we, at FinDev Canada, approach our fifth year of operation and as things continue to “open up” after the lockdowns of COVID-19.
2022 is already off to a great start.
We are very proud to have introduced our first social bond in Costa Rica, through a USD 30 million investment in Banco Nacional de Costa Rica.
As we examine the development finance horizon for the years to come, we see many of the same needs that led to the creation of FinDev Canada in 2018 and our initial strategic orientations.
Those needs have, however, grown in importance:
Given existing and new challenges, our strategic review has led us to anchor our initial development goals: to make a positive impact on women’s economic empowerment, climate action and market development.
And mobilizing private capital is crucial to creating an inclusive and sustainable future.
We’ve had remarkable success to date by partnering with financial intermediaries in order to support and serve the needs of micro, small and medium-sized businesses with tailored solutions.
Now, with post-pandemic recoveries underway, we have an opportunity to “grow into our mandate” and invest directly in key sectors in the markets we serve.
As a result, we plan to invest more in agriculture and forestry and related value chains – more in sustainable infrastructure – and we plan to offer more direct support to corporate entities, all while applying gender and climate lenses to our investments.
Finally, we will continue to “grow with purpose” as an organization and keep on deepening our commitment towards having the greatest impact we can on our three key goals: driving women’s economic empowerment, climate action and market development.
Continue to follow us on this journey as we move into the next phase of growth – and as we take action towards building a more sustainable and resilient private sector in developing economies.
FinDev Canada is committed to transparency about its operations, strategies and policies. Included below are links to FinDev Canada’s 2021 Financial Statements, TCFD Reporting and Annual Report.
