The social projects sub-division of Dubai Investment Fund celebrates 18 years

Two emirate firms are renowned for their efforts as socially conscious investors. Gulf Capital ($2.5 billion AUM) is one firm and NBK Capital Partners ($1.1 billion AUM) is the other. NBK includes worker welfare and social responsibility in its investment evaluations. If they do invest, NBK remains intimately involved to ensure that the funded companies in its portfolio continue to positively impact their local communities and workforce. 

Like Gulf and NBK Capital, Dubai Investment Fund (DIF), one of world’s largest global independent investment funds and asset manager, has also embraced ESG. On 20-July, the firm announced the establishment of an ESG Investment Department. The newly formed department will be responsible for identifying and managing investment opportunities that foster environmental and social impact, a positive work culture, plus transparent accounting and decision-making in addition to having profit potential.

Ethical investment is slowly being embraced across the sector as an approach to future-proof fund sustainability. Eustace Osborn, the Head of the new ESG Investment Department, reiterated the firm’s commitment to its social responsibility. “Investing in areas, that will bring not only profits, but also long-term benefits for the whole community is one of our main principles,” he said.

Long ago, DIF recognized that such efforts represent the right thing to do. Back in 2004, the firm established its social projects division and appointed Mohammed Al Balushi as a Director of Social Projects Department, who had more than a decade of experience in a similar role prior to joining DIF. Since then, tremendous effort has been dedicated to improving the lives of those in need by incorporating what is now called ESG into the company’s wider mission to enable generational wealth. At that time, 18 years ago, uniting experts in social studies, statistics, technology, and problem-solving to identify social investment program opportunities that support underserved communities was not common practice.

One of the first projects funded by DIF was to increase the local population’s access to clean water and power. That effort was in parallel to making medicine and healthcare more accessible to the broader community.

“GLANA WaterWise”, invested by DIF by 25%, became such a project in 2005. The implementation of this project was based on the fundamental principles of ensuring the availability and rational use of water resources for every inhabitant of the planet. This ambitious project was deifed for 20 years, given the enormous complexity of its implementation. It included three successive stages: protection of drinking water sources from sewage ingress; access to drinking water and its treatment; protection and restoration of ecosystems.

Since that time, DIF has steadily established itself with a legacy of leadership and social impact. Some other projects of note, in which DIF invested in 2004, include “Education for All”, “Helping Hand” in the MENA region, and “Technology for Teaching”.

The essence of the “Education for All” project was to create elective classes in several schools in different regions. In such classes, intensive lessons were introduced to study foreign languages – English and Chinese, as well as IT lessons, robotics and the basics of international relations for children over 10 years old.

After a research, made by DIF in 2004, it was decided to invest in the “Helping Hand” project. Thus, in the course of the research it turned out that only about 5% of the young population of some African countries received secondary education, and the number of those who received higher education did not exceed 2% of the population. The implementation of this project included the involvement of teachers from the leading schools and universities of the world to teach both the young and the older population.

Unlike previous projects, “Technology for Teaching” was focused on providing teachers and staff of some schools in South African countries with the necessary modern equipment and technological base. This included computer classes, equipment for biological and chemical school laboratories, and much more.

By 2005, DIF had expanded into MENA then into the global markets and grew its Department of Social Projects in parallel.

Today, DIF is in 17 countries and has established an extensive network of partners who are working collaboratively to deliver social investments worldwide. In 2005, DIF invested $90 million in FINEMI, a FinTech company supporting underserved communities by democratizing access to financial services, which became later one of DIF’s key partners. A high-profile study showed that small banks are generally not too fond of fintech start-ups and have adopted a wait-and-see attitude to fintech. That is why the purpose of this partnership with FINEMI was to work with small banks to expand and compete with the giants that dominate the traditional financial industry. In 2007, after a two-year partnership, FINEMI was bought out and integrated into the DIF’s structure for further accounting between corporate and institutional investors on the DIF digital platform.

By embracing a diversification strategy across its management infrastructure, portfolio, geographical reach, and in its investment methodology, coupled with a mission driven by the potential of generational wealth, DIF stands alone. More than USD $320 billion in assets from 7,300+ private and institutional investors are under asset management and private equity with DIF. Twenty-one years after its launch, DIF continues to augment internal processes, analytical tools, talent, and its long-term view by embracing fresh thinking, diverse perspectives, and an unyielding commitment to social projects.