SME Finance Forum at EBRD discusses support for small businesses

How to support small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) will be the main theme of the SME Finance Forum 2015 held under Turkey’s G20 Presidency and hosted at the EBRD on 25 and 26 June 2015. The workshop will be opened by EBRD President Sir Suma Chakrabarti and Turkey’s Undersecretary of the Treasury Cavit Dağdaş.

Representatives of the Asian Development Bank, the European Commission, the European Investment Bank, the European Investment Fund, FMO - Netherlands Development Finance Company, the Inter-American Investment Corporation, the International Monetary Gund, the Islamic Development Bank, KfW - Kreditanstalt für Wiederaufbau, the UK Department for International Development, the World Bank Group/International Finance Corporation and private sector entrepreneurs and practitioners will discuss ways to improve access to finance and support SME development through creating and safeguarding a stable business environment.

Under the G20 – Global Partnership for Financial Inclusion the SME Finance sub-group will report on efforts to strengthen support SMEs. Turkey has identified inclusiveness, implementation and investment as the priorities for its presidency in order to unleash the sector’s potential. For the EBRD the support of small private businesses has traditionally been at the heart of its mandate.

EBRD President Sir Suma Chakrabarti said: “We are honoured to host this important event at our premises as this does not only allow us to demonstrate the importance we attach to small businesses, but also take our joint activities to the next level. The EBRD has pooled all resources in this area in our Small Business Initiative in order to act swiftly and with increased impact. The exchange of views with our colleagues from partner institutions will allow us to develop our activities further.”

Topics under discussion at the workshop will include “The holistic approach to SME finance and development”, “Beyond SME lines of credit to financial institutions”, “Green approach to SME finance”, “Local currency loans to SMEs”, “Banking SMEs without banks” and others.

Managed by the International Finance Corporation, the SME Finance Forum was established by the G-20 in 2012. Its mission is to accelerate access to finance for small and medium businesses worldwide by promoting knowledge exchange, policy change, and new connections. The SME Finance Forum brings together financial institutions, technology companies, and development finance institutions to share knowledge, spur innovation and promote the growth of SMEs.