The Challenge
Women entrepreneurs in rural India face systemic barriers to scale: limited access to markets, constrained balance sheets, and lack of tailored capacity-building support. Government schemes and NGO interventions provide some relief but are fragmented and unsustainable, often failing to incentivize long-term outcomes such as productivity gains or income growth. Meanwhile, private capital perceives these women-led microenterprises as too risky or unviable to finance at scale. As a result, thousands of capable women remain under-capitalized and unable to grow their businesses, limiting their economic empowerment and resilience in the face of climate change.
Blended Finance in Action
TBFC, in partnership with an international organization, is designing a SIINC (Social Impact Incentive) model to catalyse scale for women entrepreneurs. Under this model, funders pay for verified outcomes—such as increased productivity, higher incomes, and market expansion—rather than upfront activities. The SINC allows to reach more women entrepreneurs without being constrained by its own balance sheet, while ensuring that funders’ capital is linked directly to measurable impact.
TBFC has structured the SIINC by defining outcome metrics, pricing methodologies, and payment triggers, while also aligning the interests of funders and women entrepreneurs. Unlike traditional grants, this model channels capital to the implementation partner only upon the achievement of pre-agreed outcomes ensuring accountability, incentivizing performance, and creating a results-linked pathway to finance women’s climate-resilient livelihoods.
