The day before the public event “Heading Towards the Summit: Impact Investment in the Ibero-American Region”, we held an intensive working session to dig deeper into some of the challenges and opportunities facing the impact ecosystem in the region. The session took place at Educo Hub, a space provided by one of our members, Educo ONG, a third-sector organization that has also incorporated impact investment in the Global South into its strategy, with a focus on children.
The goal was clear: to create a space for honest exchange among those driving the development of impact investment markets in different Ibero-American countries, and to begin identifying shared priorities ahead of the upcoming Ibero-American Summit in Madrid, taking place on November 4th and 5th, alongside the business gathering held in the same framework (November 3rd–4th).
The session, held on July 14, unfolded in two complementary parts. In the morning, we worked alongside the National Partners (NPs) of GSG Impact from Chile, Brazil, Central America, Colombia, Peru, and Spain. In the afternoon, the conversation expanded to include organizations from our ecosystem active in Latin America, including funders, social organizations, foundations, representatives of international bodies such as CAF, and public actors like SEGIB.
A Morning of Learning from One Another
The first part of the day was devoted to sharing experiences among the different NPs. Beyond understanding the reality of each market, the goal was to grasp how the organizations leading the development of impact investment in each country are organizing themselves institutionally, and which strategies are working. The conversations revealed the diversity of existing governance models, project typologies, and strategic priorities that respond to the needs of each context and its financing models.
From SpainNAB, we shared our associative model, which is evolving toward an increasingly broad diversity of profiles: academia, ecosystem organizations such as social enterprises and social economy entities, impact investors and other types of funders that follow impact strategies (such as ethical banking), financial intermediaries, and organizations that represent and support the entrepreneurial ecosystem. All of this falls under our 2025–2027 strategic plan, which sets ambitious goals in this area as a natural evolutionary step for the ecosystem and a way to scale up volumes of impact capital.
Although each country operates in a different context, common themes emerged across nearly every contribution: the need to generate solid evidence, strengthen ecosystem capacities, improve collaboration mechanisms and increase the visibility of impact investment among policymakers and funders. Aware of all these challenges, we also saw a clear line of work taking shape in each of our contexts and, jointly, in building a unified voice for development financing across the Ibero-American space.
The session closed with several concrete commitments for the coming months, including working toward greater alignment between the market-sizing exercises carried out in Europe and Latin America, as well as promoting joint learning spaces around innovative initiatives such as Chile’s impact matching model.
From National Experiences to an Ibero-American Agenda
The afternoon broadened the conversation to include representatives from funding organizations, NGOs, foundations and international bodies with a presence and activity in Latin America.
One topic that sparked particular interest was the role social organizations are playing in Spain and the region, increasingly present not only as recipients of funding, but also as users of repayable funds and as providers of specialized services for impact investors.
As the discussion progressed, an increasingly shared idea began to take shape: there is a unique opportunity to build a more articulate Ibero-American voice around impact financing for development.
With this in mind, the session helped identify several lines of future collaboration among the region’s different actors:
- Creating permanent cooperation mechanisms among Ibero-American NPs
- Advancing a shared vision of impact financing ahead of the upcoming Ibero-American Summit
- Strengthening spaces for applied knowledge exchange and peer learning
- Exploring joint initiatives to promote systemic change and strengthen the capacities of national ecosystems
Next Steps: More Collaboration and Shared Learning
Beyond the specific agreements reached, the session left a clear conclusion: the challenges are shared, and so are the opportunities. In an increasingly complex global context, collaboration across countries, organizations, and sectors will be key to mobilizing more capital toward solutions that generate positive social and environmental impact.
The July 14th session was, in short, the first step in a conversation that will continue in the coming months, guided by the path set toward the Ibero-American Summit in Madrid, with the aim of strengthening a shared vision for the future of impact financing in Ibero-America.
