Can "Impact Investing" Help Save the Planet?

Finance has a critical role to play in achieving conservation goals. Simply put, saving an ecosystem, or a species, isn't free. Those efforts require lots of scientific research and analysis, tools, infrastructure, and staff. WWF has been at the forefront of a variety of innovative ways to finance those efforts – from Project Finance for Permanence initiatives, to debt for nature swaps, and more. Today we're going to talk about another approach that's gaining steam: impact investing. Impact investing is all about making investments with the goal of advancing social or environmental outcomes – not about maximizing financial returns. Joining Nature Breaking today to explain how it works is Isabelle Foster, WWF's Senior Impact Investing Specialist. Isabelle is part of WWF Impact, our impact investing venture. And she's also a podcast host, having recently launched a limited-series show called Catalyzing Climate Conversations. Her new show is a partnership with the Aspen Institute's Aspen Network of Development Entrepreneurs (ANDE). Stay tuned to hear from Isabelle about how impact investing works, why WWF is investing in companies like EatCloud—whose software platform is helping grocery stores and other businesses divert food from the landfill and instead support local communities—and how these investments advance conservation outcomes on the ground. Links for More Info: Isabelle Foster bio WWF Impact PODCAST: Catalyzing Climate Conversations CHAPTERS: 0:00 Preview 0:30 Intro 1:56 What is impact investing? 5:20 How can impact investing help the planet? 8:02 WWF's approach to impact investing 13:34 Example of success: EatCloud 21:45 Podcast plug for Catalyzing Climate Conversations 27:39 Outro