Green finance accounted for only 6 per cent of sustainable finance disbursements in Bangladesh in April-June, according to figures presented at a roundtable in Dhaka on Wednesday.
Banks and finance companies disbursed Tk960.04 billion in sustainable finance during the period, including Tk61.58 billion in green finance, speakers told the event, said a press release on Thursday.
The closed-door roundtable, “Scaling Impact Through Finance”, was organised by LightCastle Partners with support from the Embassy of Switzerland in Bangladesh, in partnership with Truvalu Bangladesh and the United Nations Capital Development Fund. It was held at Hotel Sheraton in Dhaka.
Participants discussed barriers to financing businesses with measurable social and environmental impact, including through direct lending, co-investment and risk-sharing arrangements. The 90-minute discussion was moderated by LightCastle Partners CEO Bijon Islam and Truvalu Bangladesh Managing Director Sharawwat Islam.
Bijon Islam presented LightCastle’s upcoming Bangladesh-based impact fund for commercially viable businesses with measurable impact. He cited an estimated financing gap of more than $70 billion for micro, small and medium enterprises, saying catalytic capital could help reduce investment risks.
Willem Grimminck, managing director of OneTrueValue, presented the ORE II Fund, which backs climate-vulnerable small and medium-sized enterprises, particularly in renewable energy. The two funds aim to build investment track records in underserved segments and help businesses access mainstream institutional financing.
Embassy of Switzerland Senior Programme Manager Ameena Chowdhury said catalytic financing should attract private investment rather than replace it. “Bangladesh has moved beyond asking why impact investing matters. The real question now is how we bring domestic capital to work at scale,” she said.
Sharawwat Islam closed the session by summarising proposed solutions and next steps. “There is a real ambition for financing impact businesses and supply of capital is not the problem. A combination of efficient financing structures, risk-reduction mechanisms, catalytic capital, right partnerships, and built-in MRV for impact can unlock capital for the last mile,” he said.
