Sustainable development impact

Home›
Our impact›
Sustainable development impact

How we contribute to the SDGs

Investment in, implementation of, and provision of support to infrastructure is critical to achievement of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

Delivering urgent progress on the SDGs while unlocking and deploying climate finance is the most critical agenda in the markets in which PIDG operates.

PIDG investments contribute substantially towards the SDGs in several ways. For each investment, we assess this expected contribution to the SDGs, identifying the main SDGs and the most relevant indicators to which the investment contributes.

See here for more information on how our investments contributed to the SDGs in 2022 and how we measure contribution and relevance to the SDGs.

PIDG and the Impact Principles

PIDG is signatory of the Operating Principles for Impact Management (the Impact Principles) which were launched in 2019 to provide a framework for investors to ensure that impact considerations are purposefully integrated throughout the investment life cycle.

As a signatory, PIDG is committed to publicly disclosing the alignment of its impact management systems with the Impact Principles.

You can find our latest annual disclosure statement which explains PIDG’s impact management system in more detail and how it aligns with Impact Principles here.

In line with Principle 9, our latest independent verification of this alignment can also be found here.

PIDG’s Results Monitoring Handbook provides further detail on the processes and methods we use in our impact management system and is routinely updated.

Climate change and nature

Sustainable development and poverty reduction are not possible without action on climate adaptation and resilience and people depend on nature for both.

Our Climate strategy outlines our overall commitment to support the goals of the Paris Agreement on Climate Change. We take a two-pronged approach by:

Investing in projects that assist countries where PIDG operates to transition towards a global net zero carbon economy by 2050, in the context of an equitable and just transition to net zero.
Demonstrating the technical and financial viability of innovative low carbon and climate resilient infrastructure in low income and emerging markets of Africa and Asia.

See here to find out more about strategic priorities, PIDG climate action focuses on and how we invest in climate resilient infrastructure.

Nature: Infrastructure development has a significant responsibility and an opportunity to contribute towards the global goal to stop and reverse nature loss. Climate mitigation and adaptation cannot be achieved without a consideration for nature.

Many of the countries in which PIDG invest and operate, are rich in biodiversity and are where most of the world’s intact ecosystems are found. There is therefore a need to reduce the adverse impacts and increase the positive interactions between infrastructure development and nature so that we can truly achieve sustainable development, while enabling countries that need development finance to play a role in nature conservation and restoration and realise value from it.

See here to find out more about how we are embedding nature into PIDG’s infrastructure investments

Task Force on Climate-related Financial Disclosures (TCFD): PIDG became a supporter of TCFD in January 2020 and has since published our two annual disclosure reports on the recommendations of the TCFD. These reports complement our Climate strategy and document our progress in applying the TCFD recommendations, giving our stakeholders clearer insight to climate-related challenges we may face, and to the solutions we implement to help transition to a low-carbon economy.

Gender equity, diversity and inclusion

Promoting inclusion through our investments is core to PIDG’s mandate, and the Group has a high level of ambition to advance gender equality through the empowerment of women and girls.

The drive to create gender equitable access to, and control over, the benefits created by infrastructure is embedded into the fabric of everything we do. PIDG seeks to advance innovative pathways for gender equality in infrastructure, to influence the way that investors think about allocating capital in the infrastructure sector, and the way in which infrastructure is developed and managed.

We put our gender equality ambition into practice by identifying the constraints that women and girls experience in accessing resources and opportunities for improved livelihoods, and then by challenging these constraints through infrastructure projects. PIDG is also a member of the 2X Global Community, an industry-wide platform comprised of organisations with a strong gender lens in their businesses. Find out more about PIDG’s work on Women’s Economic Empowerment.

Disability inclusion: Given PIDG’s mandate in enabling sustainable infrastructure projects in low-income markets, PIDG has the potential to make an important contribution to the removal of barriers facing people with disabilities. Find out more about PIDG’s ambition on disability inclusion here.

PIDG has developed a Gender Equity, Diversity and Inclusion (GEDI) Action Plan to keep the PIDG Group on track to deliver its commitments and raise its level of ambition going forward. The plan addresses determinants of social exclusion beyond gender. See PIDG’s 2023 GEDI Action Plan, which showcases PIDG’s commitments for the year across three Pillars, in addition to detailed information about our progress and achievements across 2021 and 2022

Managing our impact

PIDG has an established systematic approach to assessing the impact potential of prospective investments, as part of PIDG’s end to end system to drive and demonstrate impact across the entire investment cycle.

You can find more detail on PIDG’s impact management system in our latest Operating Principles for Impact Management.

PIDG has also been recognised for its leadership on impact transparency and we have a number of internal processes that lead to a consistent monitoring of each investment and its sustainable development impact.

PIDG Results Monitoring Handbook provides further detail on the processes and methods we use in our impact management system.
PIDG Results Monitoring Database contains Information relating to the sustainable development impact of PIDG-supported projects and PIDG overall, is updated every 6 months and can be accessed at http://data.pidg.org/

PIDG has an active evaluation and learning program guided by an impact-focused Learning Strategy 2020-23. Workstreams under this program include:

Learning about our impact: From listening to the people our projects serve
Learning about our impact: How PIDG helped to transform markets in Vietnam
Learning about our indirect economic impacts through our participation in the Development Panel of the Joint Impact Model (JIM)
Independent evaluation commissioned by PIDG Owners
Internal and external learning engagements delivered under the PIDG Institute

There is also a library of older PIDG evaluations and studies here.