Heading for Change

For the latest instalment of our 'Voices from the Field' series we speak to The 22 Fund's extraordinary Founder Tracy Gray. Tracy talks to us about her biggest influences, how equity and justice are in her DNA, and why she believes investment capital has the power to change lives. "Equity and justice are in my DNA - passed down from my mother and father and passed down from their ancestors from being African-American in the Deep South of Mississippi. They saw so much injustice. Then I saw similar inequities when I entered venture capital over 20 years ago. Now I’m also influenced by my partner Monica whose parents were immigrants who came over with nothing and became entrepreneurs and my other partner, Rajan Kasetty, who grew up poor in rural India and co-founded a tech company that went public and is still in business today with ~ 30K employees. We can leverage investment capital to change lives, not just extract value from the planet, people, animals and minerals." Read the full interview with Tracy here: https://lnkd.in/eFdHSMws

Our Chief Catalyst Sana Kapadia on stage with Impact Europe's Roberta Bosurgi to kick off day 2 of #ImpactWeek with a fireside chat about gender-smart leadership and why we urgently need to move more capital towards women

"Why invest with a gender lens? Why not! We need to value women. We need bold action. We need to lead with the heart (and we need to raise our boys to be more heart-centered, too). We need new ways of doing business, of investing." Sana Kapadia (Heading for Change) & our CEO Roberta Bosurgi talking about gender-smart leadership at #ImpactWeek

JEI is excited to see community members Akaya Windwood & Tzeporah Berman on this list of Women Over 50 Leading on Climate Action in Forbes. We're grateful for their inspiring leadership! https://lnkd.in/dxppwxpz

Celebrating each of you working on advancing the movement of gender-smart climate action and finance- thanks for all you have done at COP29 and all you do each day to take this cause forward. Shivi Dwivedi Fleur Newman Jared Huntley Kate Landon, CAP® High-Level Climate Champions Bridget K. Burns Tara E. Daniel Natalie Klatt Rose Maizner Rachel Hills Nadja Poljo Catherine McKenna Sandrine Dixson-Declève Moa Westman Nancy Saich Nina Kolybashkina Leslie Johnston, M.Sc. Priya Thachadi Eleanor Ripoll Kathy Baughman McLeod Melinda Kramer so many more. Deep gratitude also to all our supporters and partners at Heading for Change, for enabling our work of catalysing investments in climate, nature and biodiversity to advance gender and climate outcomes. Excited to be building out this demonstration portfolio and advancing the how of gender-smart climate finance.

Last week we held a learning circle with our incredible donor partner community, where we shared exciting updates and developments that have taken place at Heading for Change over the last months. As part of this call our Head of Investments Natalie Klatt shared a snapshot of our current and anticipated global demonstration portfolio, which we’re proud to say is truly diversified and global in nature. Our investment strategy has been informed by multiple gender, social justice, and climate investment frameworks, and we are constantly trying to see where we can bring in existing frameworks and best practices to enhance our strategy and connection to the broader community of practice in climate and gender integration. We look forward to sharing our pipeline of new investments with you all in due course, but in the meantime you can find out more about our investment thesis, criteria and look through our existing portfolio on our website. And if you're interested in being a part of our inclusive donor partner community and helping us expand our impact, we look forward to you joining us here: https://lnkd.in/eVz7_Dmv

Come and hear Sana Kapadia, Chief Catalyst of Heading for Change & our CEO Roberta Bosurgi, talking about gender-smart leadership in the plenary discussion at #ImpactWeek: https://zurl.co/LoT5

Gender-responsive climate action isn’t just the right thing to do – it’s the SMART thing to do. ✅Including a gender-responsive approach in national climate action plans (NDC) delivers better climate and social outcomes– better health 🏥, quality jobs 💼, and economic development 📈- benefiting the whole of society. ✅Incorporating it into national transparency reports (BTR) 📊 helps us track whether our progress is equitable and effective for all. The world needs climate action and gender equality to go hand-in-hand –one enables the other. Because we need everyone in this collective crisis. #GenderDay | #COP29

Gender and climate are intrinsically linked - the core message of today’s Alliance for Gender-Responsive Climate Finance convening, where HE Razan Al Mubarak, the UN Climate Change High-Level Champion for COP28,  stressed the need to continue to uplift women, encouraging inclusive, locally-led climate action. The need for increased access to climate finance and the importance of gender equality to building the climate-resilient economy of the future was further echoed by leaders across international organizations and governments, civil society, and foundations during the discussion. #UAEClimate #AcceleratingActionTogether #COP29Azerbaijan Heading for Change UN Women Women's Environment & Development Organization EBRD Ban Ki-moon Foundation The Elders Foundation

Amazing to hear Priya Thachadi most recent grantee of the Climate Gender Equity Fund (CGEF) spearheaded by USAID Amazon Skoll Foundation UPS FOUNDATION INC Visa Foundation with 2X Global as the grants manager and Chemonics International as a key partner Priya in convo with Emily from the White House Gender Equality Policy Council and eloquently outlines that “in south east Asia and Phillpines where she lives that they are well past if climate change is real but are in the thick of experiencing climate crises daily- across rising sea levels, farming issues, worsened economic security and more” Bravo Priya and appreciate you making it real and grounding us in why moving gender smart climate finance is so essential and how it yields enhanced financial, economic and social outcomes 🙏🏼