Canada’s Social Finance Ecosystem - What’s Next?
About This Series
Investment Readiness Projects have helped to address research gaps and ensure the social innovation and social finance ecosystem is more inclusive while encouraging active participation by all sectors and all equity seeking groups. This series is partnered with Employment and Social Development Canada and will highlight valuable research findings and lessons learned from 5 IRP projects.
The social innovation ecosystem still doesn’t understand Indigenous innovation. This project is working to close the gap.
The rate of new businesses in Indigenous communities is growing at five times the rate of non-Indigenous entrepreneurship. The size of the Indigenous business economy is expected to grow from $30 billion to $100 billion by 2025. If impact investors want in, they need a much deeper understanding of what makes up Indigenous innovation.
Social finance promises new funding for overworked charities — but is a loan just another burden?
During the pandemic, charities have been working hard to meet increasing demands, despite a drop in donors and volunteers. The $755 million Social Finance Fund offers access to new financing — but with the majority of smaller charities unable to take on debt, many remain resource-strapped, despite our population’s growing needs.
Without inclusion, Canada’s social impact sector won’t make real change — no matter how many dollars are poured into social finance funds
While the social impact sector aims to solve a lot of societal problems, it has a real lack of inclusion, making it much harder for leaders from equity-seeking groups to scale their organizations or share their expertise. This leads to a continuous cycle of inequality, especially when it comes to accessing new financing — including the $755 million Social Finance Fund.
The Indigenous economy is worth $30 billion and climbing. Why aren’t investors getting more involved?
Indigenous women entrepreneurs are opening businesses at twice the rate of non-Indigenous women. As Canada looks to rebuild its economy, it’s more important than ever to back Indigenous entrepreneurs — but despite this, there're still significant barriers to funding, including to the $755 million Social Finance Fund.
Canada’s small businesses are closing. This organization is working to save them — by turning them into social purpose businesses.
It’s estimated that, even before COVID-19 struck, 700,000 small businesses in Canada were already at risk of closure in the next ten years, because they don’t have viable succession plans. And the pandemic made local business and community self-sufficiency even more urgent. Social acquisitions could be a big part of the solution.
INTERVIEW: Karina Gould, Canada’s Minister of Families, Children and Social Development shares her learnings and aspirations for Canada’s new Social Finance Fund
Future of Good’s CEO and Publisher Vinod Rajasekaran sits down with Canada’s Minister of Families, Children and Social Development to discuss how the Social Finance Fund will transform the country’s social finance ecosystem, how will the fund centre social equity, and how those investments can be de-risked going forward.