Cooperation agreement between ten Euro-Mediterranean banks: twenty concrete projects launched

Ten financial institutions of the Euro-Mediterranean region, soon to be joined by the African Development Bank, have signed a memorandum of agreement providing for the launch of twenty concrete projects, the European Investment Bank (EIB) has announced.

This was achieved following the work done after the launch of the Union for the Mediterranean, last year.    

The twenty projects chosen by a Strategic Committee chiefly concern the following areas: financial transfers; products related to banking services, insurance and real estate; support and assistance provided for SMEs; the financing of infrastructures and major projects.  

Each of the five working groups that recommended these projects was chaired by one of the banks: Attijariwafa bank (Morocco) for products related to loans, real estate, insurance and services; BIAT (Tunisia) for deposit accounts and savings products; the Spanish Confederation of Savings Banks (CECA - Spain) for fund transfers; Groupe Caisse d'Epargne (France) for infrastructure and project financing; Intesa Sanpaolo (Italy) for support and assistance provided for business organizations. Groupe Caisse d'Epargne, which has played a pivotal role in the creation of this group of banking institutions, also took charge of the overall management of the work.  

To support the partner countries in the Mediterranean the EIB has a dedicated arm, known as the Facility for Euro-Mediterranean Investment and Partnership (FEMIP). EuropeAid's Regional Programme supports FEMIP through a special fund.