Global Gender-Smart Fund advances financial inclusion for women

Overview

• The Global Gender-Smart Fund advances women’s financial inclusion by financing institutions that serve underserved women, women-led businesses, and women-owned enterprises in developing markets.
• GGSF combines capital, technical assistance, and gender-smart financial services to help partner institutions design more inclusive products and strengthen women’s economic opportunity.
• Since inception, GGSF has invested more than $552 million, financed institutions across 32 countries, and supported more than 407,000 women clients.
• Praxis supports this work through impact-oriented community development investments that align capital with measurable social benefit.

The Global Gender-Smart Fund (GGSF) is an evergreen global microfinance fund focused on advancing women’s financial inclusion in developing markets. Originally launched in 2009 as the Microfinance Enhancement Facility and renamed in 2024, GGSF provides financing to microfinance institutions, banks, leasing companies, and other financial intermediaries that serve women and women-led enterprises.

As a $500 million blended finance fund, GGSF helps address the persistent financing gap facing underserved women entrepreneurs. Since inception, the fund has invested more than $552 million, financed institutions across 32 countries, supported more than 407,000 women clients, and helped strengthen more than 130 financial products and services designed for women. Through this combination of capital, technical assistance, and gender-smart financial services, GGSF promotes economic opportunity, women’s leadership, and more resilient communities.

Impact Story: Building a future in rural Nicaragua

One of GGSF’s partners is Fondo de Desarrollo Local (FDL), one of Nicaragua’s largest microfinance institutions. FDL serves more than 23,000 women borrowers and maintains a strong focus on rural communities, where access to financial services is often limited. With much of its portfolio dedicated to agriculture, FDL helps farmers and small business owners invest in activities that support household income and local economic development.

For more than 16 years, Marlene Orozco Cantero, a farmer in the Waslala region of Nicaragua, has relied on FDL to help grow her livelihood. Through approximately nine loans, she has purchased land, improved her home, and invested in agricultural operations that include livestock, dairy production, poultry, pigs, corn, and beans. Marlene credits FDL’s attentive service and long-term partnership with helping her access the financing needed to steadily expand her farm and support her family.

GGSF’s investment in FDL strengthens the institution’s ability to serve women and rural clients while expanding digital banking services and improving access to affordable financial products. By investing in partners such as FDL, Praxis Investment Management^TM helps create opportunities for women entrepreneurs like Marlene, whose work contributes to stronger communities and more inclusive local economies.

The Praxis Commitment

Praxis supports organizations through investments in Calvert Impact, an impact-investing institution that advances community development financing around the world. This support reflects the Praxis commitment to allocate approximately 1% of each fund to benefit neighborhoods and individuals through community development investments.