In February 2020, SEAF Vice President Katharina Inkiriwang attended the AVPN Southeast Asia Conference in Bali - “Leveraging the Power of Networks” - which brought together a diverse array of stakeholders. With all conferences canceled for the foreseeable future, we look back at this event...
Transformative Interventions in SMEs through Gender Focused Entrepreneur Ecosystem Development and the Gender Equality Scorecard© SEAF pursues gender equality and women economic empowerment to deliver on its mission of “Improving Lives and Communities through Entrepreneur-Focused Investment” as the organization understands the critical role of SMEs as...
A View from The Front Lines March 18, 2020 - Sichuan, China SEAF Sichuan SME Investment Fund (“SSIF”) was founded in 2001 to fill the shortage of growth capital available to private enterprises in Sichuan, a western province of more than 80 million people. As with...
Gender equality is an enabler and accelerator for virtually all the Sustainable Development Goals (“SDGs”). Gender equality is a goal in its own right (SDG5), but cuts across all 17 SDGs and is reflected in 45 targets and 54 gender-specific indicators (UNDP, 2019). Women's Economic...
Building a Strong Demonstration Effect to Catalyze Capital towards Women Economic Empowerment Initiatives Gender Financing Gaps The financing gap to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) in developing countries is estimated to be $2.5 - $3 trillion per year, according to United Nations Development Program’s and UN...
It is with great sadness we reflect on the recent passing away of Michael Levett—our long-serving board member and friend these past 26 years. SEAF was only five years old when Michael joined us as a board member, and it is safe to say the...
March 9, 2020 - Skopje, North Macedonia - On February 27th, 2020, SEAF Vice President Viktor Meshkov participated in the first start-up conference organized by PWC “Pitch.Match.Grow”, discussing some of the most important issues around start-up investing in North Macedonia, providing feedback to the...
Using Gender Lens Investing to Promote Women’s Economic Empowerment and Entrepreneurship Development Invisible Barriers Women constitute half the population but have long been overlooked as entrepreneurs, employees, and consumers, particularly in developing countries such as those in Southeast Asia, the focus of SEAF’s Women’s Economic Empowerment work....
SEAF’s 30th anniversary as impact investors was truly a remarkable one, thanks to the hard work of all of those across our global network. In 2019, we deepened our commitment to improving lives and communities through entrepreneur-focused investment across emerging and frontier markets. During the course...
"How are impact investors thinking about addressing intentionality and accountability in their fund formation documents and what trends and challenges exist?" SEAF General Counsel and Chief Compliance Officer Kate Lahnstein recently had an opportunity to address those key questions in the Emerging Markets Private Equity Association's...
