Jaspers, Jeremie, Jessica Conference in Bratislava 15-16 October 2008

On 15 and 16 October 2008, the European Investment Bank Group in cooperation with the European Commission held in Bratislava a conference on the new instruments in European regional policy addressing public and private stakeholders from all EU Member States. To read the programme click here.

Background

Public authorities have been progressively confronted with growing investment needs while the resources available become more and more scarce. This clearly emphasises the need to use available funding in an effective way and at the same time, find complementary sources of investment.

As part of the continuing effort to make cohesion policy more effective, the European Commission has developed in close collaboration with the European Investment Group and three other partner institutions – EBRD, CEB, KfW – a series of instruments designed both to support project preparation and to increase the use of financial engineering instruments in the context of cohesion policy: JASPERS, JEREMIE and JESSICA. The so called “3Js” provide technical assistance (JASPERS), finance for SMEs (JEREMIE) and support for sustainable urban development (JESSICA). You will find more detailed information on the back of the conference programme.

 EIB related presentations made at this conference can be found here.  EIF related presentations are given below:

 Workshop 2: JEREMIE Status Quo

• General introduction of the JEREMIE initiative and its key-role in the context of the cohesion policy Dorota Zaliwska, Head of Unit, Financial Engineering, DG Regio
• General principles, evaluation and implementation preparation of the JEREMIE initiative Hubert Cottogni, Deputy Head of JEREMIE, EIF
• Case Study JEREMIE in Slovakia – Implementation, preparation and outlook Mario Vircik, Director of International Relations, Ministry of Finance of the Slovak Republic

Workshop 5: JEREMIE Implementation

• Case Study JEREMIE in Romania - JEREMIE implementation steps after signature of the funding agreement Stefan Ciobanu , Ministry of Economy and Finance, Romania
• JEREMIE products – Debt and Equity instruments possible in a Holding Fund Jacques Darcy, Head of Product Development, EIF

Workshop 9: European Micro Credit Initiative

• General introduction Philippe Delvaux, Financial Engineering, DG Regio
• Players, commitments and status quo of the European Micro Credit Initiative Marc Schublin, EIF
• Targets and beneficiaries of the Micro Credit Initiative Maria Nowak, President, European Microfinance Network