04/01/10

By Andrew Holt

John Kingston, founder director of Venturesome, the Charities Aid Foundation's social investment arm, has been awarded an Order of the British Empire (OBE) for services to the Voluntary Sector in the New Year's Honours list.

Kingston has been instrumental in creating and developing a social investment market in the UK, and Venturesome's influence continues to be pivotal.

Kingston said: "It really is a great privilege to be honoured for work that I love doing and wish to acknowledge the many committed people I've been lucky enough to work with over the years."

After an MBA at Manchester Business School Kingston joined 3i Group.

He then moved to Save the Children UK in 1990 as Director of Fundraising/Marketing, before joining CAF in 2001. John was Chair of the Institute of Fundraising (2000-2003), Co founder of the Social Investment Market Group and is currently chair of the Nationwide Foundation.

In 2001 he created Venturesome to pioneer a new approach to funding third sector organisations, offering bridging finance and development capital to charities, in the form of unsecured loans, underwriting and quasi-equity.

As well as being social investment practioners Venturesome also publish reports and papers on their work and that of the developing market, this includes the influential 2008 paper Financing Civil Society which has helped to create a common language for the UK's social investment market.