British International Investment reveals it made £1.75 billion of commitments in 2024 as it publishes Annual Review 

• The UK’s development finance institution reveals record levels of climate finance investment 

• Chair of BII highlights critical importance of development capital in “constrained financial environment” 

British International Investment, the UK’s development finance institution and impact investor, announced today that it had committed £1.75 billion in 2024 to create jobs, reduce aid dependency and combat the climate emergency.  

The sum was a 33 per cent increase on the previous year, despite the difficult investment environment caused by macroeconomic headwinds.  

BII’s total net assets increased to £9.9 billion (£8.5 billion in 2023) while post-tax profits improved to £213.3m compared with a £44 million loss in 2023.  

The figures are contained in BII’s Annual Review, which was published today. Over £1.09 billion of investments were made in African companies (62 per cent of total commitments), while businesses in Asia received £626 million (36 per cent). Commitments to companies with operations in both continents received £29 million.  

In total, BII invested £708 million ($903 million) in climate finance in 2024 – 41 per cent of its overall commitments for the year. This compares with just £80 million ($104 million) in 2020. The company’s climate finance assets now make up over 26 per cent of its entire portfolio, up from just over 15 per cent in 2020. Over the last three years, BII has invested over $2 billion in climate finance. 

Based on all direct renewable energy investments in BII’s 2023 portfolio, 1.5 million tons of CO2e emissions were avoided on an attributed basis, a 54 per cent year-on-year increase. This was driven by a growing renewable asset base in the portfolio and increases in the amount of renewable power produced. 

BII also made £499 million of gender finance commitments in 2024 and £880m of commitments to the poorer and most fragile countries across the regions where it invests.  

Introducing the 2024 Annual Review, Diana Layfield, Chair of BII, said: “In a constrained financial environment, BII’s ability to put capital to work repeatedly to secure development impact, while also delivering a financial return for the UK taxpayer, is particularly valuable. In an increasingly unpredictable geopolitical environment, our investments – which support emerging economies to grow, create jobs, and develop sustainable infrastructure to mitigate climate change and its impacts – are critically important.” 

Leslie Maasdorp, the Chief Executive of BII, added: “BII represents a unique platform to take development finance to the next level, at a time when that is most needed. Now more than ever, we need to be bold about the impact we can have, ensuring we bring others along with us. We need to find ways to deploy finance to drive development impact. We need to mobilise the private sector as an engine for change and transformation.”