Podcasts | May 20, 2022

Briefing: Building the next-generation of diverse climate fund managers with Bahiyah Robinson

Isaac Silk
ImpactAlpha Editor

Isaac Silk

My question when I’m really quiet, or even when I’m talking to close friends and colleagues, is one word: Why? Why does this continue to happen?”

On this week’s podcast, VC Include’s Bahiyah Yasmeen Robinson shares with host Monique Aiken her feelings in the wake of the racist attack in Buffalo. “Why does our community continue to be, and has for so many hundreds of years, been targeted, particularly with all the contributions we’ve made to this country, and to its building and its maintaining and its innovation?”

Robinson and her Include Ventures partner, Taj Eldridge, are raising $250 million for a fund of funds led by climate-focused managers of color, part of their strategy to increase ten-fold by 2030 the number of diverse-led climate funds. VC Include’s climate-justice initiative last month seeded that effort with $1 million in operational grants to 10 emerging climate managers in the U.S. and Europe.

“When allocators ask, ‘How can we support investments in climate solutions, particularly in communities of color?’ – this is one of the most powerful ways that you can do that,” Robinson says. “And we wanted to show that and not just talk about it.”