National Bank: Georgia in “leading position” in access to finance for companies

The National Bank of Georgia on Wednesday said Georgia had taken a “leading position” in the World Bank's latest Enterprise Surveys in terms of access to finance for companies, with indicators exceeding the average results of European and Central Asian countries.

The central bank said the survey had shown only 3.2 percent of the enterprises in Georgia were not satisfied with loan applications, while 53.3 percent - up by 10.4 percent compared to the previous survey - were using bank credits.

The share of respondent enterprises who considered access to finance to be the “main obstacle” to doing business has decreased to 11 percent from 22.4 percent in the 2019 survey. Globally, the same figure stands at 22.7 percent in this year's survey.

For some of the surveyed Georgian companies, the sufficiency of collateral remained a challenge, the Bank added, noting the credit guarantee mechanism of the Enterprise Georgia - the state agency promoting entrepreneurship, investment and exports - had been created in response to the issue while work was underway to develop a mobile collateral framework.

Davit Utiashvili, the Head of the Financial Stability Department of the NBG, said access to finance was an “important factor” for long-term economic growth. He added the National Bank was “actively” cooperating with the domestic banking sector to increase business lending opportunities.

The report also ranked Georgia 13th worldwide and among the top 10 states in Europe by low bribery incidence, while also being listed as the world leader in freedom from bribery while obtaining government contracts.

The World Bank's Enterprise Surveys interviewed 592 company owners and senior managers in Georgia between April and September 2023.