In this Forbes.com article, Emerson points to impressive returns from impact investments and highlights five ways "retail" investors can generate returns "while knowing their investments are managing risk through consideration of environmental issues or being well invested in communities and regions around the world to provide needed capital for sustainable business development, micro-loans to entrepreneurs and general economic development." GIIN members Calvert Foundation and Shorebank are among two organizations profiled.

Emerson explains, "In today's volatile markets, investors are looking for new ways to capture returns while managing risk. The little secret of this past year's capital crisis is that while many mainstream investments incurred significant losses in value, one category remained steady--with some investors significantly outperforming the mainstream market. It's called impact investing."

"Impact investing is not your parent's socially responsible investment strategy. For example, this past year various microfinance funds gave investors a 6% return during a period when many strictly commercial products were down three to five times that amount."

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