European Commission and EIB Group launch new Microcredit Initiative

During the Eurofi conference organised in the framework of the informal Ecofin Council held in Nice on the 12/09/2008, Philippe Maystadt, President of the EIB, announced the launch of a new facility which will support microcredit in the European Union.

The initiative known as JASMINE (Joint Action to Support Micro-finance Institutions in Europe) emphasises the synergies between various European institutions (European Commission, European Parliament), the Eurofi network, banks and the European Microfinance Network.

Its purpose is to promote the emergence of a sustainable microfinance sector in Europe, through financial support to essentially non-bank Microfinance Institutions (MFIs) and dissemination of best market practices. The aim is to rectify the imbalance between the inadequate current supply and the huge potential demand which prevails in the European market. To reach this objective, the JASMINE Initiative will primarily focus on MFIs in development phase.

In this framework, a dedicated European Investment Fund team will provide two kinds of support to MFIs:

• provision of additional capital through a co-financing facility to double the quasi equity participation/ loans granted by banks to promising MFIs (financed by the EIB);
• technical assistance (financed by the European Commission).

The initial capital base of JASMINE will be EUR 50m and the first operations will be starting early 2009.

The JASMINE initiative aims at financing MFIs and not directly microentrepreneurs.

Download the JASMINE leaflet here (PDF, 56 KB)