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5 April 2012
Environmental-Finance: UK seeds impact investment bank with £600m
Source:
www.environmental-Finance.com
The UK government has launched a £600 million ($949 million) finance institution to lend money to charities and community groups, of which an undisclosed amount will go to environmental organisations.
Big Society Capital will use cash from bank accounts that have been dormant for more than 15 years to grow Britain’s social investment market. In addition, Barclays, HSBC, Lloyds Banking Group and RBS have agreed to invest £50 million each in the fund.
A spokesman for Big Society Capital said it is not yet known how much of the £600 million will go to charities and community groups with an environmental focus and could not disclose details of any planned investments.
He said, however, that any environmental organisations it invests in must generate a social benefit as well.
Out of its £3.2 million invested to date, it has provided £750,000 to the Community Generation Fund, which lends money to install wind turbines and small hydro-electric generators to produce energy for disadvantaged communities.
The communities will have an opportunity to sell any surplus power back to the national grid and use the income to support other community projects such as fuel poverty reduction, community centres and youth projects.
The Community Generation Fund will initially aim to support 11 communities to build their own renewable projects.
“This is about supplying capital to help society expand,” the BBC reported Prime Minister David Cameron as saying.
Nick O’Donohoe, CEO of Big Society Capital, said that this is an “exciting time” for social investment.
“The number of community interest companies – entities set-up with a clear social mission and a legal commitment to use their surpluses predominantly in support of that mission – has grown to 6,000 and are proliferating at a rate of close to 200 new enterprises a month,” he said.
“It is now estimated that a third of new enterprise start-ups are socially motivated,” he added.
Elza Holmstedt Pell
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