Special credit line launches to encourage women entrepreneurship in Georgia
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The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) is launching a program to support women entrepreneurship in Georgia.
Over €50 million (130 million GEL) from the EBRD for credit lines was provided in a comprehensive programme of support for women-led small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs).
The program has been officially launched on the EBRD’s 24th Annual Meeting and Business Forum held in Tbilisi today and tomorrow. Today also marked a commitment by two Georgian banks to join the program.
The Bank of Georgia and TBC Bank, the two largest banks in the country, signed letters expressing their interest in joining the regional Women in Business programme, which covered Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Georgia, Moldova and Ukraine.
"We are delighted to launch the Women in Business Programme in Georgia today. We believe women’s entrepreneurship and women-led SMEs are an economic priority for ensuring sustainable growth," Managing Director for SME Finance and Development at the EBRD, Claudio Viezzoli said.
"The Bank of Georgia and TBC Bank are long-standing partners of the EBRD and I am pleased to see them ready to seize the opportunity of the women’s banking market,” he noted.
The Women in Business programme was the first product to be launched under the EBRD’s Small Business Initiative in the country.
"We will work closely with selected local banks to provide targeted financing products, responding to the needs of women-led businesses, which tend to be smaller than their male counterparts and operate in lower value-added sectors, " Director of the EBRD Small Business Support Charlotte Ruhe said.
She also noted that this was not just a question of promoting equality but also a question of economics.
"The EBRD helps local banks adapt their products to better serve their women clients and begin to seize the opportunity arising from the worldwide, multi-billion dollar women’s banking market,” she said.
Top governmental officials from more than 60 countries, heads of international institutions, global decision-makers, corporate executives and staff from the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) are gathering in Georgia’s capital Tbilisi to consider a strategy for the EBRD regions for the coming years.
The head of TBC Bank is proud to receive a special award from the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) for his bank’s support of an artificial snowmaking project in Georgia’s Gudauri and Bakuriani winter resorts.
One of Georgia’s leading banks, TBC Bank, has won two awards from the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) today while the Bank's CEO was named CEO of the Year 2014 of Central and Eastern Europe and CIS countries at the Europe Banking Awards 2014.
Here you can see the live Twitter feed with hashtags # EBRDam, #EBRDopen and #Georgia15.
The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) is putting a special emphasis on environment protection by making the 24th Annual Meeting in Tbilisi carbon neutral.
Georgia is a successful, ambitious nation with many opportunities for further development and growth, believes the country’s Prime Minister Irakli Garibashvili.
A $31.5 million USD loan to Georgia’s BasisBank is one way the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) is supporting small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), energy efficiency measures and access to trade finance in Georgia.
The European Union (EU) is expected to distribute new investments of more than €2 billion (5.3 billion GEL) for Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) in Georgia, Moldova and Ukraine.