By Bisola Adeyemo
Igugu Global, a climate fintech platform, has launched the Green Finance Marketplace (GFM), a benchmarking platform that offers consistently comparable climate data for financial actors growing cross sector, multi geography portfolios in Africa.
The Green Finance Marketplace (GFM) includes enterprise and professional tiers and is designed to aid portfolio managers overcome the challenges of searching and benchmarking climate risk and climate-related investment opportunities across Africa.
As regulators push for the significant expansion and standardization of climate-related disclosures, Igugu Global offers a market-led solution to bridge the gap in Africa and accelerate the flow of capital to natural and sustainable infrastructure.
Starting with 9 countries that account for more than half a billion Africans and 65% of the continent’s GDP, the platform standardizes more than 1000 companies across sectors, their environmental risk disclosed and their sustainable commitments, to the likes of the TCFD, verified.
“Currently, less than 2% of African companies disclose climate exposure and financing; therefore, Igugu Global data is a key step to evaluating the climate exposure of assets in a comparable manner,” said Anele Makhwaza, Founder of Igugu Global.
“The green finance market has surpassed $1.6 trillion in bond issuance, but only $5.4 billion has gone to Africa, the most vulnerable of the continents in light climate change. Regulation is scattered and inconsistent, but Igugu Global’s GFM solves this by consolidating debts and companies’ disclosures in one place.”
Unlike peer capital markets solutions, Igugu Global, according to Ms. Makhwaza, is has set out to facilitate the carbon transition by relieving financial actors of the time and cost of searching for climate related investment pipelines, managing and disclosing portfolio climate finance commitments.
“In becoming the registry for how and at what price Africa comes to market; financial actors can use Igugu Global’s consensus and disclosure to monitor and circumvent opaque transitional climate policy and identify deal flow,” she said.
Promoting awareness and understanding of climate-related risks and sources of adaptation finance will help all African businesses to contribute to the transition to a low-carbon economy and to Africa’s climate goals.
“Today’s announcement marks the creation of Igugu Global’s platform, and growing businesses can look forward to greater visibility and the benefits of working with a climate fintech platform that integrates company commitments with its green finance directory,” she added.
