Backgrounder: The Social Finance Fund

Backgrounder

The Social Finance Fund

To encourage innovative approaches to persistent and complex social challenges, the Government of Canada is creating a Social Finance Fund. This will give charitable, non-profit and social purpose organizations access to new financing to implement their innovative ideas, and will connect them with non-government investors seeking to support projects that will drive positive social change.

To help accelerate that change, the Government proposes to make available up to $755 million on a cash basis over the next 10 years for a new Social Finance Fund and an additional $50 million over two years for social purpose organizations to improve their ability to successfully participate in the social finance market.

The proposed Social Finance Fund could generate up to $2 billion in economic activity, and help create as many as 100,000 jobs over the next decade. In addition to these measures, the Government will continue to work on exploring other recommendations from the Steering Group's report.

Co-Creation Steering Group

In June 2017, the Government of Canada created a Social Innovation and Social Finance Strategy Co-Creation Steering Group, primarily comprised of experts from the charitable and non-profit sector, to provide recommendations on the development of a social innovation and social finance strategy.

The Steering Group delivered its final report, Inclusive innovation: New Ideas and New Partnerships for Stronger Communities, in August 2018.

One of the report’s key recommendations was to create a Social Finance Fund to help close the capital financing gap faced by organizations that deliver positive social outcomes, and to help accelerate the growth of the existing social finance market in Canada.

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