With a $30 Million investment for Sub-Saharan Africa, Green Climate Fund joins a coalition of investors and donors to protect the progress made in achieving universal energy access. This week, the board of the Green Climate Fund (GCF) approved a $30 million investment in the Energy Access Relief Facility, a fund to support off-grid energy companies through the COVID-19 pandemic. As a pioneer in the...
THE CHALLENGE: EXPENSIVE DIESEL GENERATORS Due to limited and unreliable grid electricity, two thirds of electricity in Nigeria is provided by expensive diesel and petrol generator sets. Relying on petrol generators costs off-grid microbusiness owners—such as vendors in rural marketplaces—up to 50 percent of their...
Acumen has invested in Kheyti, a company whose greenhouses help farmers in India adapt to the effects of climate change. THE CHALLENGE: CLIMATE CHANGE DESTROYING FARMER CROPS About 70 percent of families in rural India—most of whom own less than five acres of land and...
Acumen has invested in Bridge, a fintech company paving the way to financial stability for Americans with its unique fee-free banking services. THE CHALLENGE: EXPENSIVE AND EXCLUSIONARY BANKING More than 63 million Americans do not have access to affordable banking services. Big traditional banks often...
By Madeleine Schachter, Acumen Partner, Artist & Assistant Professor at Weill Cornell Medicine on August 25, 2020
As the year began, no one could have anticipated the havoc wrought by the COVID-19 pandemic. As of this writing, more than 809,000 people have died and 23.4 million have been afflicted worldwide. In the United States, low-income people and people of color have been...