IDB promotes innovative public-private solutions to accelerate changes

The public sector must assimilate common innovative practices in private companies to produce the changes that Latin America requires when setting the path of recovery after the crisis of the COVID-19 pandemic and the threat of climate change, said Irene Arias in an interview , general manager of the innovation laboratory of the Inter-American Development Bank, IDB Lab.

On the first day of the PPP Americas 2021 event, Arias indicated that they are analyzing new models of Public-Private Partnerships (PPP) for development and that for this it is necessary for governments to be able to “connect with private sector counterparts interested in offering innovative solutions. “

According to Arias, PPPs present today a great opportunity to leverage innovation and amplify its impact, which is why IDB Lab has worked to expand the value proposition of these contracts to bring the classic concept of physical infrastructure to one of social infrastructure where technology plays a key role.

In PPP Americas 2021, innovative and efficient PPP experiences will be shared, such as the case of Inova HC, a network of hospitals and clinics in Brazil, and social impact bonds in Colombia.

“They are examples that have already been tested and that have undergone rigorous evaluations to extract lessons learned” and how they can be reproduced, Arias explains to EFE.

“We definitely see it (PPP Americas) as a business forum, not just a forum for the exchange of knowledge,” underlines Arias, who insists that one of the objectives of this meeting is that “it can be translated into tangible projects.”

The objective of the department that Arias directs, “is to use innovation and everything that technology offers today to generate more inclusive models that allow the region to overcome great challenges in an innovative way with scalable solutions for the benefit of poor and vulnerable ”.

IDB Lab, with more than 1,500 partners around the world, including the 26 countries in Latin America and the Caribbean where it generates impact, was conceived to assume a level of risk that the IDB cannot take with the public sector or IDB Invest with the sector. private.

That is its differentiating role, “taking greater risk to test new ideas and business models that accelerate a recovery in the region that is green, inclusive and resilient, the north of Vision 2025 that the IDB Group has defined.”

Arias highlighted the power of IDB Lab to mobilize resources from third parties, “six dollars for every dollar of equity capital last year,” which allows them to amplify the impact of the public resources it manages. In their history, since 1993, they have invested more than US $ 2 billion and currently approve about 100 million a year in about one hundred projects, which can range from 150,000 to US $ 5 million.

“The size is not so important, but the power they can have in changing paradigms, in opening new markets or in testing solutions that can later be scaled through public policy or public or private financing,” says Arias.