The 2030 agenda for impact: Portugal's social investment story
The Portuguese national strategy for impact investment has evolved over the past ten years. Its key iterations are marked by three staple reports.
In 2014, the Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation convened the Portuguese Social Investment Taskforce to support the development of and provide leadership to Portugal’s emerging social investment market. Maze was responsible for coordinating the Taskforce on behalf of Gulbenkian and serving as secretariat. For over 12 months, the Taskforce gathered on various occasions to discuss the challenges and opportunities of promoting social investment in Portugal.
In a first report, written by maze and published in 2015, the Taskforce proposed five recommendations to promote social investment in Portugal, with each recommendation including an action plan with various initiatives, to be implemented within a five-year period.
The recommendations included:
- Strengthen social organisations through capacity-building programmes.
- Introduce financial instruments suited to social organisations and social innovation.
- Promote an outcomes-based culture in public services.
- Set up a knowledge and resource centre.
- Promote specialist intermediaries to facilitate access to capital.
In 2018, a progress report was published, monitoring the advancements made regarding the 2015 recommendations and inviting all sector players to reflect on learnings, achievements and new challenges. The report described undeniable progress in social investment in Portugal, highlighting the critical role of the Portugal Social Innovation initiative in boosting the ecosystem. It emphasised two priorities for further work in the following years:
- Developing initiatives that attract more national or international private capital to the sector.
- Involve the public sector, both centrally and locally, to ensure outcomes-based service contracting.
Finally, in 2022, the Advisory Board of the National Competence Centre for Social Innovation was created. It capitalised on and followed up on the work of the Taskforce, mobilising entities from the public, social, and private sectors under the coordination of the Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation and with the support of maze. The entities that comprise the Advisory Board collaborated to present a revised version of the national strategy for investment and social innovation until 2030: The 2030 Agenda for Impact. Its vision is to establish Portugal as an international benchmark and a European hub for social innovation.
The Agenda sets five goals and targets for four different types of ecosystem players, translated into 14 specific recommendations to be implemented by 2030. Together, the recommendations have the potential to mobilise around €500 million for social innovation and investment in Portugal, tripling the current market size.
Read more about The 2030 Agenda for Impact here →