Clean energy products empower women

Community development investing |

Community development investing supports better lives for women and their communities

For three years, Anna Giuilias has been a sales agent at Green Light Planet. Anna promotes clean energy products, such as solar lanterns and clean-energy cook stoves, among other women in her community in Tanzania.

The products help children study even when it’s dark, enable stores to stay open longer hours and let people cook in a healthier environment. Anna says she loves her job for enabling her to start her own shop with the money she has saved.

Green Light Planet receives financing from SunFunder, a solar finance business based in San Francisco and Tanzania, with a mission to financially support solar energy in emerging markets. It provides short-term inventory and project finance loans to leading solar energy companies to help them scale deployments of solar energy systems and catalyze growth in the sector. SunFunder has financed $7 million of solar projects, with 20 solar companies in six countries, and maintains a zero percent default rate. This has helped over 250,000 people get access to affordable solar energy.

Praxis Mutual Funds® supports projects like Green Light Planet and SunFunder through investments in Calvert Foundation, an impact-investing institution that helps people around the world through community development financing.

Both projects are part of Calvert Foundation’s Women Investing in Women Initiative, a first-of-its-kind initiative that allows investors to fund organizations and social enterprises around the world that support the empowerment of women and address their unique needs.

For more stories about people who have benefitted from these investments, visit the Praxis Community Development Investments page.

About Praxis Mutual Funds and Everence®

Praxis Mutual Funds, advised by Everence Capital Management, is a leading faith-based, socially responsible family of mutual funds designed to help people and groups integrate their finances with faith values. To learn more, visit praxismutualfunds.com.

Everence helps individuals, organizations and congregations integrate finances with faith through a national team of advisors and representatives. Everence offers banking, insurance and financial services with community benefits and stewardship education. To learn more, visit everence.com or call (800) 348-7468.

About Calvert Foundation

Calvert Foundation enables people to invest for social good. Through its flagship Community Investment Note®, more than 15,000 investors have channeled more than $1 billion in investments to hundreds of nonprofits and social enterprises worldwide. Investor dollars empower women, fund the construction of affordable housing, provide loans to small-business owners, increase access to health care, and support fair trade and sustainable agriculture. To learn more, visit calvertfoundation.org.

Author

Everence staff

Disclosure

Foreside Financial Services, LLC is not affiliated with Calvert Foundation. 

The Fund’s stewardship investing strategy could cause the fund to sell or avoid securities that may subsequently perform well, and the application of social screens may cause the fund to lag the performance of its index.

Calvert Social Investment Foundation, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit, offers the Community Investment Note®, which is subject to certain risks, is not a mutual fund, is not FDIC or SIPC insured, and should not be confused with any Calvert Investments-sponsored investment product. This is neither an offer to sell nor a solicitation of an offer to buy these securities; the offering is made only by the prospectus, which should be read before investing.