Press Release
Créditos Photo: Jonathan Ernst / World Bank
Publicado en Septiembre 20, 2021

Joint SDG Fund, UNDP-SDG Impact & OECD Collaborate to Introduce Impact Standards in Developing Countries


The UN Joint Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) Fund, UNDP-SDG Impact and the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), are announcing a collaboration to pilot the OECD-UNDP Impact Standards for Financing Sustainable Development.

This initiative is pioneering the standardization of impact measurement and management in developing countries and generates verifiable guidelines and tools that link financial products to the achievement of the SDGs.

The OECD-UNDP Impact Standards for Financing Sustainable Development provide a framework for donors, development finance institutions and their private sector partners to make financial decisions and manage projects in ways that positively impact sustainable development and improve the transparency of development results.

The Joint SDG Fund will pilot the OECD-UNDP Impact Standards at the country level in its Catalytic Investment portfolio and will encourage the consortia and financial vehicles that it financially supports to adopt the SDG Impact Standards for Enterprises, Bond Issuers, and Private Equity Funds. Together, these sets of standards create one harmonized framework that connects different actors through a shared language and approach for integrating sustainability into decision-making through impact management while contributing to the SDGs.

icon

The Joint SDG Fund is a multi-partner trust fund established by a UN Resolution. The Fund’s mission is to activate integrated policy and financing levers as accelerators for the achievement of the SDGs. Under its Catalytic Investment portfolio, the Joint SDG Fund’s strategy is to blend public and private financial flows to innovate and progressively reach scale. In April 2021, US$41 million was awarded to Fiji, Indonesia, Malawi, Uruguay under the Catalytic Investment portfolio as they cumulatively seek to leverage US$5 billion for the SDGs. Twelve additional proposals are being incubated. SDG Invest, an action-oriented collaborative of UN and private investors, hosts these innovative programmes in addition to a pipeline of blended finance transactions.

SDG Impact is a UNDP led initiative to catalyze private sector investment towards the achievement of the SDGs by providing investors and businesses with the clarity, insights, and tools required to strengthen and authenticate their contributions. Through multiple rounds of public consultation, SDG Impact has developed the SDG Impact Standards for Enterprises, Bond Issuers and Private Equity Funds. SDG Impact has also developed investor maps which identify investible opportunity areas and business models, provided via an interactive platform https://sdginvestorplatform.undp.org/, and a free online IMM training course developed in partnership with Duke University.

The OECD is an international organization that works to build better policies for better lives. OECD provides a unique forum and knowledge hub for data and analysis, exchange of experiences, best-practice sharing, and advice on public policies and international standard-setting. The Impact Standards for Financing Sustainable Development were approved by the OECD Development Assistance Committee (DAC) in March 2021. The Standards were developed through a twelve-month interactive process with the 300+ members of the OECD DAC Community of Practice on Private Finance for Sustainable Development (CoP-PFSD), a platform for dialogue and a forum for discussion and information sharing between DAC members, the private sector and other key stakeholders in blended finance and impact.