Back in October, ImpactAlpha hosted an Agents of Impact call entitled “The surprising resurgence of impact-first investing.” At the time, we joked that, if it was a resurgence, we had missed the initial surge.
Regardless, we were appreciative to see the spotlight on our niche corner of the impact investing world. With the need for impact-first capital greater than ever, we are eager to insure that this attention does not wane.
For that reason, Ceniarth is sponsoring a slate of impact-first coverage in ImpactAlpha that will highlight the asset owners, philanthropists, fund managers, social enterprises and other market participants that embody an impact-first investing philosophy. Our goal is to continue making explicit the need for “fit for purpose” capital that respects the inherent trade-offs required to invest in ways that support vulnerable communities globally.
We recognize that it has become increasingly fashionable to declare that business as usual counts as philanthropy. We don’t buy it.
This does not make us crusaders against capitalism. We respect commercial enterprises as engines of economic development. But business is generally not philanthropy. Philanthropy is philanthropy.
Impact-first investing, a philanthropic approach that takes on economically irrational risk or seeks more limited returns, is essential to addressing issues of global poverty.
Five levers
At their best, sophisticated practitioners tasked with managing charitable assets will leverage a range of tools in pursuit of driving measurable outcomes on the targeted problems that they aim to solve. The tools at their disposal may include traditional grantmaking, recoverable grants, loan guarantees, technical assistance, activism and policy advocacy, as well as impact-first investing. The most effective combination of tools will vary widely depending on the impact objective.
There are rarely free lunches or win-wins. To address widening social inequality, we must be honest about the type of capital required to meet this moment. In general, we have found that our impact-first deals hit one, or more, of these five levers:
- Catalytic, junior commitments. First loss or mezzanine instruments are often needed to de-risk impact-focused transactions for other investors.
- Patient, modest returning capital. Impact money seeking “below market” returns is essential to scaling many interventions from community development financial institutions in the US to microfinance institutions abroad.
- New funds, new borrowers. Providing early validation and commitments to new funds or pilot debt to social enterprises is highly catalytic as getting new vehicles off the ground is incredibly hard.
- Higher risk geographies. As most of the world’s most vulnerable communities are in places that conventional investors would not dare tread, delivering capital to these places is inherently high impact.
- Innovative financing mechanisms. Impact-first deals regularly require navigating novel structures, subsidies, and other unique deal terms that may be untested or uncertain.
At Ceniarth, we believe the best way to lead is not by intellectual or moral persuasion, but by just doing (see Ceniarth’s full portfolio on ImpactAlpha Edge. Accredited asset owners can also view Ceniarth’s active pipeline). Our hope is that in the year ahead these impact-first pages will be filled with examples, not theories. To kick-off that spirit of sharing, we will be regularly sharing the latest quarterly slate of impact-first deals that we have closed and why we feel they fit the theme. Away we go…
Iungo Capital
($2.5 million commitment closed in Q4 2025)
Iungo is a mezzanine debt provider to high impact SMEs in East Africa. The firm provides technical assistance to borrowers to help them enhance finance capabilities, an area of unfortunate, but frequent underinvestment. Iungo is differentiated not only by providing this “missing middle” debt finance, but also in its network and ability to tap into local co-investors.
Faced with a growing loan book, but uncertain development finance support in Q4, Iungo needed a quick infusion of balance sheet support. Ceniarth, alongside other funding partners, was able to meet this need at a reasonable cost of capital. A big piece of this unlock was guarantee support from the Livelihood Impact Fund which allowed us to upsize this commitment.
What impact-first levers does it hit? Patient, modest returning capital (5%) in a higher risk geography (East African SME lending). In addition, the deal required collaboration with co-funders to quickly fill a critical gap left by the pullback of a DFI lender.
Hatch Africa
($2.5 million commitment closed in Q4 2025)
Hatch Africa is the largest poultry producer in sub-Saharan Africa, supplying genetically optimized day-old chicks to smallholder farmers across six countries. These chicks have been genetically engineered and patented to optimize the efficiency of meat and egg production, while thriving in the region’s conditions. This results in significant income yield for farmers who are achieving a profit of nearly $10 per bird raised.
The company has demonstrated strong revenue growth — reaching $71 million in 2024 — anchored by a profitable Ethiopian operation that has historically supported expansion into newer markets. Ceniarth, alongside a co-funder, are providing working capital at the parent-company level of the operation that can be down-streamed to subsidiaries as needed.
What impact-first levers does it hit? Working capital lines for African agricultural enterprises, even those with the meaningful scale of Hatch carry inherent risk that most investors are not comfortable stomaching in higher risk geographies where FX risk and geopolitical instability abound.
Fòs Feminista / INNOVA
($1.4 million commitment closed in Q4 2025)
Fòs Feminista is an international alliance that focuses on advancing women’s sexual and reproductive health and rights across 39 countries. Its Panama-based social enterprise, INNOVA Health Supplies, cost-effectively procures and distributes contraceptives and other reproductive health commodities to partner organizations and health ministries. The loss of funding via USAID created an acute supply chain crisis for the organization and the prospect of vulnerable women and girls across the region losing access to essential reproductive health products.
This loan will help support the purchase of additional healthcare units enabling INNOVA to move toward a warehousing model that can better buffer against future disruptions. The loan is structured to Fòs Feminista rather than directly to INNOVA, which meaningfully reduces credit risk given Fòs Feminista’s historically strong balance sheet.
What impact-first levers does it hit? This loan combines an innovative financing mechanism (leveraging the balance sheet of a non-profit parent company to derisk the loan) with patient, modest returning capital (4%) given the market context.
Lendable Transportation & Energy Fund
($3 million commitment closed in Q4 2025)
Having provided Lendable with some of its first balance sheet lending capital, the firm has grown into one of Ceniarth’s largest and longest-standing partners. The Transportation & Energy Fund represents the first vehicle in their new Sustainable Finance strategy, lending to SMEs and middle-market enterprises in mobility, energy, and sustainable agriculture across Sub-Saharan Africa, Asia, and Latin America (see, “Lendable returns to asset-backed lending for the green transition”). Alongside the primary environmental focus of this fund, we expect significant societal and livelihood co-benefits.
While Lendable has a strong track record managing over $500 million in collective capital, this fund will take on new sectors and deal structures that remain unproven relative to the firm’s traditional fintech lending. Despite the risks, Lendable has managed to close significant capital for this new strategy from a range of development finance institutions, foundations and private investors.
What impact-first levers does it hit? Ceniarth provided half of our capital ($1.5M) to the mezzanine tranche of the fund providing a catalytic, junior commitment. While Lendable is an established manager, this deal is a brand new fund strategy in higher risk geographies.
California FarmLink
($2 million commitment closed in Q1 2026)
CAFL is a nonprofit CDFI that provides loans and technical assistance to small-scale, underserved farmers, ranchers and fishers across California, with 65% of its portfolio serving low-income borrowers and nearly 60% serving non-white borrowers. CAFL provides loans for land purchase, housing expansion, equipment purchase and other agricultural needs that are often overlooked by conventional lenders.
Ceniarth’s five-year loan at 3% provides patient, low cost capital in a moment when federal policy and funding uncertainty has put pressure on the stability of CDFI’s financing pipelines. Ceniarth was also able to support a co-funder to invest an additional $6M on identical terms bringing CAFL a total of $8M in this transaction.
What impact-first levers does it hit? Patient, modest returning capital (3%) for a relatively small CDFI at a time of significant uncertainty. In addition, we collaborated with a co-funder to significant increase the size of this transaction.
Community Finance Ireland
(£2.0 million loan closed in Q1 2026)
Uniquely working in both Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland, CFI is the largest nonprofit lender to the Voluntary, Community, and Social Enterprise sector across the entire island of Ireland, with over £105M disbursed to 700+ community organizations since its founding in 1995. CFI support organizations deeply embedded in underserved and predominantly rural communities, such as sports clubs, charities, and social enterprises.
Our £2 million senior unsecured loan to CFI will allow it to refinance and free up capital for new lending in the Republic of Ireland that will unlock commitments from the European Investment Fund and private impact investors.
Ceniarth’s role as the first private, impact-focused investor in this structure carries meaningful capital additionality: without our flexible refinancing, CFI could not contribute sufficient subordinated capital to make the Republic of Ireland special-purpose vehicle viable.
What impact-first levers does it hit? Patient, modest returning capital (3%) from the first private impact investor in the structure will set an important pricing signal for the Irish CDFI sector. The innovative financing mechanism required by this deal is a structure that demands a flexible, impact-first approach.
Growing pipeline
There will be much more to share in the coming quarters, as our diligence queue is chock full. There are over 20 individual transactions that have been internally approved for diligence and are at various stages of our evaluation process. The majority of these deals should close in the next two quarters.
As always, the pipeline of transactions waiting to move into this formal underwriting is long and growing. With finite resources in terms of capital and team, we can’t get to it all and we always need new co-funders. For those curious about impact-first dealmaking, please reach out to us. Capital is in much shorter supply than deals.
Diane Isenberg and Greg Neichin are Ceniarth’s managing directors.
