Our Top Articles & Opportunities of the Month

1. Seagrass meadows are amongst the largest carbon sinks in the world, and WA has a giant ocean of them on our doorstep, the Indian Ocean, which we share with over 35 countries.  WA is also a world leader in remote sensing and management technology across numerous sectors and industries.  So, does Western Australia have the capacity leverage these strengths to lead on Ocean Innovation?  As one of WA's leaders in the innovation space, Andrew Outhwaite has played an incredibly impactful role as a connector, innovation funding facilitator, and social entrepreneur over the past 15 years.  Andrew's latest project For Blue addresses this timely, and critically important topic in the context of the climate emergency, the Indian Ocean, and all WA's industries which depend on it.  Importantly, Andrew's work looks at how these technologies can restore natural capital in this vast and important ocean ecosystem while building financially sustainable industries in these areas.
   
    
2. OPINION: On Friday WA had its largest ever mass public protest in what was arguably the world's largest ever protest at Climate Strike 2019.  It was reported on page 30 of The West Australian the next day.  This apparently passes as journalism in the only daily newspaper for 2.6M Western Australians?
   
    
3. Tech behemoth Amazon Co-founds The Climate Pledge, Commits to net zero carbon by 2040 and 100% renewable energy by 2030 and invests $100 million in reforestation projects around the world to begin removing carbon from the atmosphere. The Forbes article suggests Bezos is under some pressure on this subject in light of employees first strike ever in the company's headquarters. According to the Amazon Employees for Climate Justice, "thousands of Amazon employees joined the strike" on September 20th.By some accounts, this is the first strike ever in the company's Seattle headquarters. Bezos’ Climate Pledge is probably seeking to diffuse this internal rebellion. But in doing so, he has legitimized the internal advocacy by Amazon employees.
    
4. The ascendancy of Amazon as a major and transformative force in retailing has reawakened public concern in a very old issue economic concentration. On one hand, companies can come to dominate their sectors through superior products, innovations, technology or scale, arguably a good impact.  On the other hand, market dominance leads companies to extract value, raise prices and externalise costs. That's a major negative impact on communities and the environment. Market power is also a problem for economists when used to keep other competitors from entering the market, further strengthening the incumbents’ economic position and market power.
    
5. Toward an Impact Economy
   "To achieve real diversification in the innovation ecosystem.. we need to narrow the gap between those at the leading edge of technology and those groups on the periphery.. the proliferation of social entrepreneurs, work integrated social enterprises, trading NGOs, Indigenous businesses, and community enterprises - who all form distinct parts of the emerging impact economy, but until now, have been on the periphery of the innovation ecosystem, and underserved by mainstream capital markets. We need impact measurement and demonstration of a broader range of outcomes, including public value creation that account for externalities not traditionally included in economic assessment (such as the externalised costs of industry value extraction)."
    
6. Games Economists Play   The hostile reaction to Appelbaum's new book condemning the economics profession is revealing and damning. Economists responsible for the dysfunctional growth and trickle down neoliberalism we have inherited were outraged that Applebaum suggested that economists don’t care about inequality.  They posited that it is only because of economists that we know that inequality has risen. How dare he point out that economists have occupied a privileged position in public life? The mainstream economists argued that economics advisors closest to power should not be implicated in whatever unsatisfactory state of economic affairs exists today.
    
7. Turning Impact Intention into Impact Evidence
   Accounting for impact is notoriously difficult. And though impact investors have long turned to the GIIN's IRIS metrics as a standardized measurement tool, as SoPact co-founder Hetal Sheth points out, the IRIS metrics don't make impact strategy actionable. Now that the GIIN has reintroduced its standards with IRIS+, Sheth explores how the new metrics improve on the previous version – and how SoPact’s Impact Cloud platform can help investors use them to build a robust impact management strategy.
    
8. Combining investment money with grants.  How does blended finance work?  Here's an example from one fund
   Blended finance has been successful in large transactions  but it’s also a great tool for smaller investments. Features of blended finance are:
   -It’s concessional – making it more tolerant to failures either because of lower risk-adjusted returns, or it is being deployed as grant.
   -It’s patient – it is willing to stay invested for longer time frames.
   -It’s credible – the use of public money tends to lower uncertainty from political risks and signals credibility to private investors.
    
9.  Be The Change: Five Steps For Transitioning Into A Values-Aligned Career
    
10. Australia’s ESG activist says measuring impact is critical
    Robust impact measurement across social/ cultural/ environmental metrics is absolutely essential to accounting for impact investment and social enterprise. But in the (recently) booming world of impact investment and social entrepreneurship the boom is largely coming from "impact/SDG washing". This is brought about by companies and investors laying claim to impact simply by screening for negative impact, or ticking an SDG or two as a proxy for a social license to operate. To be clear, having a few SDG coloured boxes next to your impact, or not investing in coal, or investing in a notionally 'good' tech startup doesn't make for an impact investment.