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Home/DFI Index/DFI Transparency Index 2025/SIFEM (Switzerland)
DFI

DFI Transparency Index 2025

SIFEM (Switzerland)

Score:
32.5
Position:
17 / 22 (Non-sovereign)

Overview

The Swiss Investment Fund for Emerging Markets (SIFEM), is a Swiss development finance institution. SIFEM was established in 2005, after taking over the investment portfolio of the State Secretariat for Economic Affairs (SECO). SIFEM promotes long-term, sustainable and broad-based economic growth in developing and emerging countries. It was restructured to its current form in 2011. It joined the European Development Finance Institutions Association (EDFI) in 2005. SIFEM is wholly owned by the Swiss Government.

Analysis

Overall, SIFEM came 14th out of the 22 non-sovereign institutions assessed, scoring 32.5 out of 100. This marks a significant improvement from its performance in 2023 when it scored only 16.5 and ranked fourth to last. A key improvement across the board was SIFEM’s new bulk download export of investment data, which improved its format score throughout the assessment. Between 2023 and 2025, SIFEM saw improvements across all components other than ESG and Accountability to Communities where its score stayed the same. SIFEM continued to not publish its investments to the IATI Standard.

SIFEM scored 11.13 out of 20 in the Core Information component, moving from 17th to 12th in the rankings. It went form scoring on eleven out of the seventeen indicators to all seventeen in 2025. This improved performance is largely due to its new bulk download file disclosing investment data, which improved SIFEM’s score across many indicators. However, SIFEM also began disclosing new data points in this component including a new disclosure policy, unique identifier, status, domicile, total investment cost, funding source, E&S risk category, and signature date. SIFEM continued to not score for sub-national location, sub-sector, disbursement, disclosure date, signature date and last update date.

In the Impact Management component, SIFEM came 17th scoring 7 out of 20 and improving from its position as second to last in 2023. Its improved ranking is reflected in publishing its approach to determining impact attribution and impact measurement approaches. SIFEM also began disclosing additionality statements at the project level. However, it continued to not score for sector/country strategy, evaluations, activity indicators/metrics and results.

SIFEM scored 7.67 in the ESG and Accountability to Communities component, keeping its position as joint fourth last in 2023. Its performance showed no progress across all indicators in this component. It continued to score 100 per cent for its E&S and project-level grievance (PGM) community disclosure policies. It also continued to score points for E&S global disclosure policy. However, SIFEM continued to not score for any other indicators in this component, including project-level indicators.

For Financial Information, SIFEM scored 4.25 out of 15 and improving ranking from joint last in 2023 to 7th. It saw improvements on currency of investment, concessionality, and share of equity. It continued to not score for repeat investment, co-financing, and mobilisation. It did not score for either of the new climate finance indicators.

SIFEM scored 2.5 in the Financial Intermediary (FI) and Sub-Investment component, moving from joint last to joint third out of 22 non-sovereign portfolios. Its improved ranking is reflected in its new policy for disclosing sub-investments and new disclosure of private equity fund sub-investments. It continued to not score for the FI (bank) use of funds and FI (bank) sub-investments indicators.

Core Information 11.13 / 20
Impact Management 7 / 25
ESG & Accountability to Communities 7.67 / 30
Financial Information 4.25 / 15
Financial Intermediary Sub-investments 2.5 / 10

Recommendations

  • SIFEM should review its disclosure policy according to current best practice and the DFI Transparency Tool.
  • It should become an IATI publisher and disclose all investments to the IATI Standard.
  • SIFEM should disclose further Core Information data including sub-national location, sub-sector, disbursement, disclosure date, signature date and last update date.
  • SIFEM should publish its sector or country strategies, develop an evaluation policy and disclose the evaluations it conducts.
  • It should disclose project-level Impact Management indicators, including activity indicators/metrics and results.
  • SIFEM should disclose project-level ESG and Accountability to Communities indicators, including summary of E&S risks and E&S documentation.
  • It should develop an early disclosure policy covering, at a minimum, high-risk projects and disclose investments in line with the policy.
  • SIFEM should create an independent accountability mechanism (IAM), following best practice examples and incorporate disclosure requirements for an IAM into existing policies.
  • It should provide assurance of community disclosure for investments when disclosure is required.
  • For Financial Information indicators, SIFEM should disclose repeat investment, mobilisation, and loan tenor. It should consistently disclose detailed co-financing data.
  • SIFEM should disclose its climate finance methodology and should provide detailed project-level climate finance data, including amounts split by mitigation and adaptation finance and climate finance rationales.
  • SIFEM should align its policy for disclosing FI sub-investments with the DFI Transparency Tool and disclose accordingly, including for sub-investments through banks.
  • It should define use of funds for FIs (banks) at both the organisational and project level.
Core Information 11.13 / 20
Impact Management 7 / 25
ESG & Accountability to Communities 7.67 / 30
Financial Information 4.25 / 15
Financial Intermediary Sub-investments 2.5 / 10

Deep Dive

Core Information

11.13 / 20
About component

The basic information that describes a DFI’s organisational policies and investments. This type of information is typically found in key organisation documents and represents the first tier of project information, typically disclosed on project web pages or in files available for bulk download. At the organisation level this includes access to information policies and annual reports. At the project level, this includes project titles, locations, and key dates.

Does the development finance institution (DFI) have a disclosure or access to information policy?0.75 / 0.75
Does the policy include a presumption of disclosure?0 / 0.75
Does the policy have limitations of commercially sensitive information and sensitive internal deliberations information?0 / 0.75
Does the policy have an independent appeals process?0 / 0.75
Does the DFI's portal allow free, bulk export of data?0.67 / 0.67
Does it contain detailed disaggregated data?0.67 / 0.67
Is the data published under an open licence?0 / 0.67
Does the DFI disclose an annual report?0.75 / 1
Does the DFI disclose a project title?0.38 / 0.5
Does the DFI disclose a unique identifier for the project?0.38 / 0.5
Does the DFI disclose the current status of the activity?0.75 / 1
Does the DFI disclose a description of the activity?0.25 / 0.5
Does the DFI disclose the objectives, rationales, and expected outcomes of the activity?0.25 / 0.5
Does the DFI disclose the country the activity takes place in?0.38 / 0.5
Does the DFI disclose the sub-national location the activity takes place in?0 / 0.5
Does the DFI disclose the domicile of the investee?0.5 / 1
Does the DFI disclose the activity as sovereign or non-sovereign? Or; Does the DFI disclose the activity as public sector or private sector?1 / 1
Does the DFI disclose the sector of the activity?0.38 / 0.5
Does the DFI disclose the sub-sector of the activity?0 / 0.5
Does the DFI disclose the investment instrument of an activity?0.75 / 1
Does the DFI disclose the total investment cost?0.17 / 0.33
Does the DFI disclose the DFI commitment for the investment?0.25 / 0.33
Does the DFI disclose the disbursement for the investment?0 / 0.33
Does the DFI disclose the source of funding for the investment?0.5 / 1
Does the DFI disclose the name of the client?0.38 / 0.5
Does the DFI disclose a description of the client? (non-sovereign only)0.5 / 0.5
Does the DFI disclose a relevant DFI contact?0.38 / 0.5
Does the DFI disclose a relevant client contact?0.38 / 0.5
Does the DFI disclose the environmental and social (E&S) risk category of the activity?0.5 / 1
Does the DFI disclose the date of activity disclosure?0 / 0.25
Does the DFI disclose the approval date of the activity?0.25 / 0.25
Does the DFI disclose the signature date of the activity?0 / 0.25
Does the DFI disclose the last update date of the project data?0 / 0.25

Impact Management

7 / 25
About component

The ways in which a DFI predicts, measures, and evaluates the impacts of their investments. At the organisation level, this includes an impact measurement approach. At the project level, this includes activity indicators/metrics and results.

Does the DFI publish a methodology explaining its approach to impact measurement?1.25 / 1.25
Does the DFI indicate which standards/initiatives it is aligned to?1.25 / 1.25
Does the DFI explain its approach to determining additionality? (non-sovereign only)1.25 / 1.25
Does the DFI explain its approach to determining impact attribution?1.25 / 1.25
Does the DFI publish sector or (multi-)country strategies?0 / 3
Does the DFI have a policy on the evaluation of investments?0 / 1.5
Does the DFI disclose the evaluations that it conducts?0 / 1.5
Does the DFI identify the development additionality of its investment? Or; Does the DFI identify the financial additionality of its investment?2 / 2
Does the DFI disclose results indicators for the activity?0 / 3
Does the DFI disclose metrics, definitions and/or methodologies for the indicators?0 / 3
Does the DFI disclose baseline data for identified indicators?0 / 2
Does the DFI disclose a target value for the indicators?0 / 2
Does the DFI disclose an actual/current value for the indicators?0 / 2

ESG & Accountability to Communities

7.67 / 30
About component

The ways in which a DFI predicts, mitigates, and communicates the ESG aspects of their activities. At the organisation level this includes E&S global disclosure policy and E&S community disclosure policy. At the project level this includes E&S plans and assessments, and assurance of community disclosure.

Does the DFI have a policy on early disclosure of investments?0 / 0.83
Does the DFI clearly articulate what E&S documentation will be disclosed for medium and high-risk projects?0 / 0.83
Does the DFI disclose the E&S policies/standards it applies (e.g. IFC Performance Standards or in-house policies) for its investments?0.83 / 0.83
Does the DFI have a policy that specifies when a document should be translated and in which language?0 / 0.83
Does the DFI disclose an explanation of project risk categorisation?0 / 0.83
Does the DFI disclose a list of investment exemptions?0.83 / 0.83
Does the DFI have a community disclosure policy?1 / 1
Does the policy require early disclosure to project-affected people?1 / 1
Does the DFI clearly articulate what E&S documentation will be disclosed to project-affected people for investments?1 / 1
Does the DFI have a free, prior, and informed consent (FPIC) policy?1 / 1
Does the DFI disclose the availability of the Independent Accountability Mechanism (IAM) on its website?0 / 1
Does the DFI IAM have a publicly available registry that publishes results, responses, or findings?0 / 1
Does the DFI require clients to disclose the availability of the IAM to project-affected people where appropriate? Or; Does the DFI state that it will disclose the availability of IAM to project-affected people?0 / 2
Does the DFI require clients to disclose the availability of the project-level grievance mechanism (PGM) to project-affected people where appropriate? Or; Does the DFI state that it will disclose the availability of the PGM to project-affected people?2 / 2
Does the DFI disclose a summary of E&S risks for an activity?0 / 1
Are E&S standards triggered by the project identified?0 / 1
Does the DFI disclose the minimum E&S documentation for the risk categorisation?0 / 1.33
Does the DFI disclose what E&S documentation was produced for the activity?0 / 1.33
Does the DFI disclose all identified E&S documents that were produced for the activity?0 / 1.33
Does the DFI state if disclosure of the activity to projected-affected people was required?0 / 0.75
If yes, then: Does the DFI state the date of community E&S disclosure?0 / 0.75
Does the DFI state the place of community E&S disclosure?0 / 0.75
Does the DFI state the method of community disclosure?0 / 0.75
Does the DFI state what documentation was disclosed?0 / 0.75
Does the DFI identify the language of disclosure to project-affected people?0 / 0.75
Does the DFI state if the presence of a project grievance mechanism was disclosed and the method it was disclosed?0 / 0.75
Does the DFI state if the presence of an independent accountability mechanism was disclosed and the method it was disclosed?0 / 0.75
Does the DFI identify the main shareholders of the client company?0 / 1
Does the DFI disclose a beneficial ownership statement?0 / 1
Does the DFI disclose the presence of the IAM on the DFI project page?0 / 1

Financial Information

4.25 / 15
About component

This information provides details on the financial performance of DFIs and the structuring of investments. At the organisation level, this includes audited financial reports. At the project level, this includes currency of investment, mobilisation, and concessionality

Does the DFI disclose audited financial reports/statements?0.75 / 1
Does the DFI publish a methodology explaining its approach to calculating climate finance?0 / 1
Does the DFI disclose whether an investment is a repeat investment?0 / 1
Does the DFI disclose the currency that the investment is made in?1 / 1
Does the DFI disclose whether investment has co-financers or guarantors?0 / 0.33
If there are co-financers, does the DFI disclose the identity of the co-financers?0 / 0.33
And, does the DFI disclose the amount of financing provided by each co-financer?0 / 0.33
Does the DFI disclose how much of the DFI investment amount was concessional?1 / 1
Does the DFI disclose why concessional finance was necessary?1 / 1
Does the DFI disclose how much private finance was mobilised?0 / 3
Equity - Share of equity: does the DFI disclose what percentage of the client company was purchased through the investment?0.5 / 0.5
Debt - Loan tenor: does the DFI disclose what is the length of the loan?0 / 0.5
Does the DFI disclose whether an investment includes climate finance?0 / 0.8
If the investment includes climate finance: Does the DFI disclose whether it is mitigation and/or adaptation climate finance?0 / 0.8
Does the DFI disclose the amount of climate finance for the investment?0 / 0.8
Does the DFI disclose the amount of mitigation and/or adaptation finance for the investment?0 / 0.8
Does the DFI disclose a rationale for why climate finance has been counted?0 / 0.8

Financial Intermediary Sub-investments

2.5 / 10
About component

This information relates to the ways in which investments in FIs are used. At the organisation level, this includes FI sub-investment policy. At the project level, this includes private equity fund sub-investments and FI (bank) sub-investments.

Does the DFI have a policy for disclosing qualifying sub-investments?1.25 / 1.25
Is the DFI policy for disclosing qualifying sub-investments in line, or more comprehensive, than the DFI Transparency Tool?0 / 1.25
Does the DFI define use of funds for FIs (banks) at organisational level?0 / 1.25
Does the DFI disclose private equity fund sub investments?1.25 / 1.25
Does the DFI disclose private equity fund sub-investments satisfying the DFI Transparency Tool?0 / 1.25
Does the DFI disclose use of funds for FIs (banks) at project level?0 / 1.25
Does the DFI disclose FI (banks) qualifying sub-investments according to their policy?0 / 1.25
Does the DFI disclose FI (banks) sub-investments in line with the DFI Transparency Tool?0 / 1.25