- €40 million loan to strengthen healthcare sector resilience amid coronavirus pandemic
- Financing to support private developer of a new Istanbul hospital
- EBRD work is now fully dedicated to coronavirus response
Further strengthening Turkey’s healthcare sector amid the global coronavirus pandemic, the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) is providing a €40 million long-term loan, of which €30 million is committed on signing, to the private developer of the Başakşehir Çam ve Sakura City Hospital on the outskirts of Istanbul.
The €1.6 billion hospital was built under a public-private partnership (PPP) in the Istanbul district of Basaksehir.
In response to the pandemic, part of the new hospital complex opened in April to treat the rising number of Covid-19 patients. Now fully operational with 2,682 beds, it is among the largest in Turkey.
The hospital was developed and built by a joint venture between Turkey’s Ronesans Healthcare and Japan’s Sojitz Corporation. Earlier this year it won the Award of Merit at ENR’s Global Best Projects competition in the healthcare category.
The EBRD funds will replace short-term loans from local banks that Ronesans Healthcare used to finance its equity contribution to the PPP project. Access to longer-term financing will strengthen the financial resilience of this key hospital developer and operator.
As part of its cooperation with the EBRD, the company supports the improvement of employment opportunities for women in technical positions and is conducting a gender audit of the hospital facilities to improve women’s access to healthcare services.
The new financing responds to the needs of local companies grappling with the impact of the coronavirus pandemic. So far in 2020, EBRD investments in Turkey have exceeded €1 billion.
The EBRD is a leading institutional investor in the country. Since 2009, the Bank has invested almost €12 billion in various sectors of the country’s economy, with almost all investment in the private sector. The EBRD’s €6.7 billion Turkey portfolio is the largest among the 38 economies where the Bank invests.
