The Best Working Capital Initiative award went to Chile’s Empresas IANSA for pulling off the Latin American country’s first public sustainability-linked receivables purchase programme. The $22 million facility – under which the global invoices of Empresas IANSA subsidiary Patagoniafresh are financed at preferential rates if it hits targets related to greenhouse gas reduction, water efficiency and the adoption of circular economy principles – will help the company achieve its ambitious sustainability goals and could finally pave the way for similar structures in the region.
Building on a strong foundation
Empresas IANSA is no newcomer to sustainable finance. The 40-year old food company – whose well established sustainability policy is based around the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals – agreed in 2022 to an environmental, social and governance (ESG) linked syndicated loan to refinance its debt.
Interest rates for the $53 million facility, led by Banco Santander Chile, were tied to Empresas IANSA’s progress towards three environmental goals: reducing its CO2 emissions by 19%, increasing its use of higher-tech irrigation to cut water use in beet production, and revaluing 86% of the waste from its nine plants in Chile and Peru.
Keen to replicate the success of this facility, Empresas IANSA wanted to explore how sustainable finance principles could be applied to also optimise its working capital and strengthen financial ratios at its Patagoniafresh subsidiary.
However, ESG-linked working capital solutions had not yet been attempted in Chile. And the global value chain of Patagoniafresh – which exports natural ingredients like vegetable pulps and juice concentrates to over 40 countries – added another layer of complexity.
Fresh territory for ESG finance
To find a solution, Empresas IANSA turned once again to Banco Santander, which was able to successfully structure an ESG-linked receivables purchase programme that unlocks liquidity from Patagoniafresh invoices while also incentivising movement towards three of Empresas IANSA’s most strategic sustainability goals.
As with Empresas IANSA’s syndicated ESG facility, sustainability KPIs are integrated directly into the receivables financing, which consolidates the invoices of over 60 Patagoniafresh debtors under a single contract.
Discounts are linked to the company’s progress on lowering its Scope 1, 2 and 3 emissions per tonne of production, using higher-tech irrigation in beet production, and revaluing more of its waste to reduce landfill and shift towards a more circular economy.
A technical feat
Judges hailed the programme as representing a new milestone for sustainable finance in the region, and scored it highly on innovation. They acknowledged the technical challenges of tying ESG data to working capital pricing and were impressed by the concrete nature of the environmental goals embedded in the structure.
They also noted how well the structure meets Patagoniafresh’s operational needs. For example, it offers the flexibility to include several debtor and seller jurisdictions under one programme, making it highly scalable. And to help preserve Patagoniafresh’s customer relationships, it uses the company’s existing collections account and is silent to debtors.
Judges also recognised the intensive collaboration required at Banco Santander to develop, customise and execute the programme – between Chilean and global teams as well as within multiple areas of the bank including Receivables Financing, Sustainable Finance, Banking, Legal, Operations and Financial Planning.
Highly replicable
Few metrics are yet available for the programme, which is still being implemented after closing in June 2025. But by embedding sustainability into its day-to-day working capital decisions, Empresas IANSA has once again signalled to stakeholders its commitment to ESG principles and demonstrated how corporates can marry working capital optimisation with tangible environmental impact.
And even at this early stage, the programme raises the bar for best practice and communicates to other banks and corporates in the region that structuring ESG receivables finance is a challenge worth taking on.
“This pioneering but highly replicable structure showcases how banks and corporates can redefine receivables finance as a lever for ESG transformation,” said Mike Hewitt, CEO at Working Capital Forum. “By expanding the scope of sustainable finance beyond traditional loans and into receivables financing, Empresas IANSA has set an important benchmark for Chile and Latin America and opens the door for further innovation.”