The Global Impact Investing Network (GIIN) is the global champion of impact investing, dedicated to increasing the scale and effectiveness of impact investing around the world. Impact investments are investments made into companies, organizations, and funds with the intention to generate positive, measurable social and environmental impact alongside a financial return, made in both emerging and developed markets and targeting a range of returns from below market to market rate depending upon investors’ objectives. GIIN builds critical infrastructure and supports activities, education, and research that help accelerate the development of a coherent impact investing industry.
Why it matters: GIIN provides the critical infrastructure—standards, research, education, and activities—necessary to transform impact investing from scattered individual efforts into a coherent global industry operating at scale. By championing impact investing and accelerating industry development through building shared frameworks and supporting investor education, GIIN demonstrates that increasing the scale and effectiveness of investments generating positive, measurable social and environmental impact alongside financial returns requires coordinated infrastructure rather than fragmented approaches. The organization’s work shows that creating a coherent impact investing industry capable of channeling capital to solutions across emerging and developed markets demands dedicated effort to establish standards, provide research, and support activities that enable investors to pursue objectives ranging from below market to market rate returns while maintaining impact integrity.
