About BAS

BAS projects
Project evaluation
Market development activities
Linkages with EBRD banking activities

About BAS

The BAS Programme works with micro, small and medium-sized (MSME) enterprises to improve their performance by involving local business advisors. BAS assists individual enterprises to engage with local consultants on narrowly-based, specific projects with a rapid payback. The supported projects typically last around four months and assist enterprises to develop and grow by enhancing their competitiveness, marketing and financial management, quality management systems and strategic business planning.

Additionally, BAS carries out market development activities to facilitate development of a sustainable infrastructure of local business advisory services in the countries of operation.

BAS intervention is systemic in that it targets the market system by acting as a facilitator for the use of private-sector consultants by MSMEs to obtain a diverse array of services. BAS operates on both the demand and on the supply side: on one hand it emphasizes the benefits of using external consultants to the enterprises, on the other, BAS directly increases the supply and quality of local advisory services.

The BAS Programme is implemented through a well defined field management structure, comprising BAS teams of local nationals in each country of operation.

At present BAS operates in 19 countries in South East Europe, Russia, Central Asia and the South Caucasus through 31 BAS offices, and currently there are 752 active BAS projects across all these countries. BAS has utilised 1, 765 local consultants, all screened and approved by the local BAS offices, who maintain a full list of qualified consultants and their level of expertise .

BAS projects

Enterprises can apply to the BAS programme for assistance in the following areas:

• Management information systems and other IT solutions
  
• Strategy development, including enterprise restructuring, reorganisation and management
• Business planning, including proposals, business plans and feasibility studies for project finance
• Market research and marketing planning
• Cost accounting and cost reduction studies
• Engineering studies
• Energy efficiency and environment related advisory services
• Quality management and certification systems
• Business partner and investor search
  

BAS teams then help the enterprises identify a suitable consultant from the BAS database and provide the following support:

• Project Development - including enterprise diagnostics, matching enterprise needs (demand) with available consultancy (supply), defining consultant assignments
• Monitoring during project implementation
• Financial commitment: enterprise is ready and able to pay the total project cost. 25-75% of the total project cost (programme specific) is then reimbursed by BAS upon project completion through a grant

The Grant Guideline Matrix is used in order to prioritize interventions to preserve the Programme’s additionality. Higher grants may be given to:

• Smaller enterprises
  
• Projects involving certain types of consultancy services where market supply is less mature
• Enterprises located in less developed or rural areas

Project evaluation

Approximately 12 months after each BAS project has been completed, a Project Evaluation Report is prepared evaluating the benefits derived from the project and its impact on the company, depending on the nature of the project:

• Improved market performance (as seen by: increased sales; increased exports; introduction of new product line)
  
• Improved management effectiveness (as seen by increased turnover; increased productivity per worker; introduction of new organisational structure)
• Reduced costs (as seen by: reduced production costs, labour productivity increases)
• Introduced quality management and certification (as seen by: related certification awarded; associated new business; associated internal organisational improvements)
• Improved environmental management (as seen by: related certification awarded; associated new business; reduced emissions or energy consumption)
  

Projects are then rated accordingly on the following scale:

• Highly successful
• Successful
• Satisfactory
• Unsatisfactory
• Cancelled
  

The final rating of a project is based on two sets of evaluations: first, the project is assessed on the quality of implementation, and then, one year later, on the sustainable impact the project has had on the enterprise in relation to the project objective. In these evaluations, the OECD Development Assistance Criteria (DAC) of project monitoring is incorporated which entails questions related to the relevance, efficiency, effectiveness, impact, and sustainability of a project.

Occasionally, when enterprises’ priorities or circumstances change during the project, or if management is unable to commit to the project, the BAS team will cancel the project and funds are reallocated to a new project with another enterprise. In these situations, no payments have, or will be, made, since the BAS grant is only paid on satisfactory completion of a project.

Market development activities

One of the main objectives of TAM/BAS is that their programmes to promote economic transition in the countries of operation are sustainable and the benefits from the intervention continue after assistance has been completed.

In the case of BAS, a key element is the development of a sustainable infrastructure of local business advisory services, as this will contribute to the improved performance of the MSME sector once BAS exits a country.

In order to achieve this objective, BAS combines assistance at the enterprise level with market development activities. Examples of the latter include MSME and consultancy training, support to and development of, existing relevant local institutions, visibility and dissemination, and informed contributions to EBRD policy dialogue.

Linkages with EBRD banking activities

As the EBRD increases its activities in the “South”, “East”, and Russian regions, the development and growth of local enterprises is central to EBRD operations. Many enterprises require non-financial support in addition to, or in preparation for, potential investments. TAM/BAS expertise and experience has proven to be beneficial at promoting private and entrepreneurial initiatives, particularly at the pre-investment stage.

TAM/BAS is therefore a core instrument for Bank institutional building and EBRD banking operations to increase the Bank’s transition impact by leveraging the programme with EBRD indirect (via local financial institutional banking partners) and direct MSME financing.