About the EBRD and south-eastern Europe [EBRD

The EBRD has been very proactive under the Stability Pact for south-eastern Europe and leads the international community's efforts on regional private sector development initiatives. The Bank has focused on enhancing trade flows, on broadening support for small and medium businesses, on facilitating cross border investments, as well as on financing several regional infrastructure projects. The EBRD is also a full member of the Business Advisory Council under the Stability Pact.

More information about economic reconstruction and development in South-eastern Europe is available at www.seerecon.org.

In recent years, the EBRD has supported SMEs in the region through:

Trade Facilitation mechanisms and credit lines with local banks.
Establishing micro-finance institutions in Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Kosovo, Bulgaria, Romania, Serbia and Montenegro, FYR Macedonia and Moldova. By end-2003, more than 100,000 loans had been granted to entrepreneurs and small businesses.
Providing management advisory services for local enterprises though the Business Advisory Services Programme (BAS) and the TurnAround Management Programme (TAM).
Small donor supported equity funds such as the Albanian and Kosovo Reconstruction Equity Funds.

Facilitating foreign and domestic private investment

The EBRD's core business is to facilitate domestic and cross-border private investment, which has grown rapidly in the last three years. Over the years 2001-2003, the Bank invested €3.2 billion (over € 1 billion per year on average), a substantial increase over the nine previous years (1992-2000) during which an aggregate of €2.6 was committed.

Alongside its own financing in the region, the EBRD mobilises additional funds from private commercial banks through syndication and parallel lending. Commercial syndication is becoming significant on both private sector industrial projects and on infrastructure.

Priorities for the future

Going forward, the highest priorities for the EBRD are to speed up the implementation of existing projects and to confirm the Bank's willingness to share risks and to financially and institutionally support the region. The EBRD will continue to promote private sector development and investment flows by deepening existing approaches and launching selected new initiatives.