IFC, a member of the World Bank Group, the Global Impact Investing Network (GIIN), and a group of leading impact investors announced today the launch of the Joint Impact Indicators (JII), a set of high-level indicators that impact investors can use to measure and report on their investment activities. This harmonized set of indicators will help further promote the fast-growing market for impact investing, which has the potential to channel $26 trillion into investments that have a positive social, economic, and environmental impact, alongside financial returns. The JII has been endorsed by leading impact investors and associations that have called for others to join them in using these indicators. JII is a set of impact indicators – starting with gender, jobs, and climate – aligned between the Harmonized Indicators for Private Sector Operations (HIPSO) and the IRIS Catalogue of Metrics, the two impact indicator sets used by most impact investors.
“These indicators are testament to the excellent leadership, technical expertise, and strong collaboration of all partners involved,” said Issa Faye, Director of Sector Economics and Development Impact, IFC. “While we recognize there is much work to be done to fully harmonize impact measurement and reporting, this is an important step forward for the industry.”
Institutions adopting the JII are signaling their intent to use these indicators and participate in a broader conversation that builds on the harmonization effort. This is a first step toward identifying a core set of indicators that can help define a minimum scope for impact measurement and reporting for all impact investors.
“Rigorous, credible impact measurement and management are fundamental to the integrity of the impact investment market,” said Amit Bourit, CEO of the GIIN. “The JII – which complements IRIS+ Core Metric Sets – will increase the understanding of impact performance. Once investors adopt common indicators, the industry can move in the direction of comparability of impact investments, so they can know what will generate the greatest impact. This is crucial, because the challenges the world faces are far too urgent for capital to underperform.”
The JII will help reduce reporting burden on investee companies and increase the availability of comparable impact data to inform decision-making. By setting clear and common indicators, the JII will help capture the economic, social, and environmental impacts of investments, allowing investors to improve their effectiveness, transparency, and accountability. This approach is in line with the Operating Principles for Impact Management launched in 2019 and already adopted by nearly 120 financial institutions from 30 countries managing over $360bn in impact assets
