Unlocking Systemic Impact: Reimagining Public–Investor Partnerships - A Roundtable on Systems Finance for Sustainability Transformations
Speakers & Featured Cases
Zambia – Green Transition Facility
A $50 million multi-instrument facility blending catalytic grants, guarantees, and return-seeking capital to accelerate Zambia’s shift toward a green, inclusive economy.
Eastern Europe – Mayors for Economic Growth
A new municipal finance model enabling cities to pool resources, attract catalytic investment, and co-finance integrated urban transformation projects that strengthen resilience, inclusivity, and vibrancy.
Catalonia – Shared Agendas under RIS3CAT 2030
The Government of Catalonia is pioneering a place-based systemic investment model through its Shared Agendas, aligning government, business, research, and communities to create pipelines of investable projects for green and just transition goals.
Rockefeller Philanthropy Advisors – Systems Thinking for Impact Investing
RPA’s Shifting Systems Initiative recently launched a Systems Thinking for Impact Investing Primer and Playbook, offering practical tools for foundations, funds, and family offices to embed systems thinking across their strategies, capital deployment, and impact measurement.
C3 Labs – Collaboration for Complex Challenges
Launching in 2025 with pilots in Kenya and Thailand, C3 Labs focuses on the Climate-Biodiversity-Food Systems Nexus. A case clinic, co-led by Georgetown University and UNDP, will explore how this coalition can influence future systemic investment theses and funding models.
Objectives
Engage funders on new possibilities for investment in development
Exchange experiences and opportunities with governments, investors, and partners on financing large-scale societal transitions
Context & Rationale
Despite unprecedented global wealth (over US$460 trillion), our collective ability to address today’s most urgent challenges remains constrained. Climate change, inequality, biodiversity loss, and persistent development divides are not just underfunded—they are misfunded.
Development finance remains fragmented and siloed:
Institutional silos separate governments, IFIs, private sector, and civil society.
Sectoral silos lock financing into single domains like agriculture or energy.
Financial silos prevent blending of grants, loans, guarantees, and private capital.
Meanwhile, mainstream finance continues to undermine sustainability: in 2024 alone, fossil fuel subsidies hit US$7 trillion and banks channeled nearly US$6 trillion into fossil fuels since the Paris Agreement.
To deliver on the SDGs, we must shift from financing projects to financing systems—aligning diverse forms of capital to drive structural, sustainable change.
Logistics
To ensure a smooth arrival, please note the following logistics:
Arrival and check in: All participants are kindly requested to arrive at the corner of 45th Street and 2nd Avenue to go through the NYPD barrier and the UN Security.
Roundtable participants: please arrive at 09:40. The Roundtable will begin promptly at 10:00 and conclude at 11:30 at the Doha Room (11th floor).
Case Clinic participants: if you are also joining the Case Clinic (C3 Labs), please arrive at 13:10 for the session starting at 13:30 and ending at 14:30 at the Large Conference room (11th floor).
Please make sure that you have your valid UN Ground Pass or valid government-issued ID.
Escort to the meeting room: Upon arrival, you will be welcomed by UNDP colleagues who will accompany you to the meeting venue. Please look for signs with the name of the event.