THE EUROPEAN INVESTMENT BANK announced the expansion of the SheInvest* project to mobilise an additional €2 billion (£1.75bn) in gender-responsive investment throughout Africa, Asia, and Latin America.
Thomas Östros, vice-president of the EIB, announced the extension while speaking at the Finance in Common Summit in Abidjan (a city on the southern Atlantic coast of Côte d’Ivoire, West Africa).
Thomas Östros said: “I am very proud of what the SheInvest initiative has achieved over the past three years. It has been a game changer in our EIB support for women-led enterprises across Africa. Combining this success with our track record of gender projects in Asia and Latin America as well — ranging from gender-responsive metro projects in India, to access to finance for women entrepreneurs in Brazil — it was a natural next step for us to not only raise the bar in monetary terms but also geographically expand this initiative.”
Together with its partners on the continent and through Team Europe, the EIB has mobilized a total of €2 billion in investment in less than three years, since the start of SheInvest at the end of 2019 to promote gender equality and women’s economic development in Africa.
SheInvest is complemented by the African Women Rising Initiative, a €2 million (£1.75mn) technical assistance programme, which supports intermediaries in developing financial and non-financial services tailored to women entrepreneurs’ needs in sub-Saharan Africa.
The initiative also mentors and builds the capacity of women entrepreneurs.
A new cooperation agreement between the EIB and the Development Bank of Rwanda (BRD) has been signed yesterday (20) as part of this initiative. This will allow BRD to improve the financial access of women and create specialised advisory services for female entrepreneurs operating micro, small, and medium-sized businesses in the nation.
Previously, at the end of 2021, the two banks co-financed a €30 million (£26mn) long-term credit to aid businesses affected by COVID-19.
The European Investment Bank (EIB) is the long-term lending institution of the European Union and is owned by the EU Member States. It makes long-term finance available for sound investment in order to contribute towards EU policy goals both in Europe and beyond, including the UN Sustainable Development Goals.
The Development Bank of Rwanda (BRD) PLC is Rwanda’s only national development finance institution with a mandate to ensure that the private sector plays its role in sectors critical to achieving the National Strategy for Transformation (NST1) and the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) by providing affordable, long-term, customized development finance.
In order to further advance Rwandan women’s economic empowerment, EIB and BRD will collaboratively create strategic objectives and key performance indicators to incorporate gender equality issues in BRD’s lending and consulting efforts.
The African Women Rising Initiative, which has been implemented in Uganda, Senegal, Côte d’Ivoire, Ghana, and Rwanda, assists local banks and microfinance institutions in creating and actively promoting gender-intelligent financial and non-financial products and services that are better suited to the needs of women entrepreneurs, with the goal of increasing women’s economic empowerment in the target nations.
*SheInvest, is an initiative by European Investment Bank to boost gender equality and female economic empowerment.
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