Washington, D.C., October 13, 2014—
IFC, a member of the World Bank Group, and the Finnish Fund for Industrial Cooperation (Finnfund) will streamline their collaboration to provide much-needed financing to private companies in emerging markets and help boost growth and jobs.
Finnfund is the 23
rd
development finance institution to sign IFC's Master Cooperation Agreement (MCA), which standardizes steps that lenders take when co-financing projects with IFC. This streamlined approach saves time and money for lenders and borrowers. Since the MCA was established in 2009, signatories have co-invested more than $3 billion in loans with IFC to support private sector development.
"We foresee more collaboration with IFC and other development financiers in areas such as renewable energy. Simplified steps for this collaboration save costs and bring benefits to our clients,” said Jaakko Kangasniemi, CEO of Finnfund.
Dimitris Tsitsiragos, IFC Vice President, said: “IFC and Finnfund play a catalytic role in private sector development by providing long-term risk capital in challenging markets. Through the MCA we will be able to more swiftly respond to private sector financing needs when commercial financing is hard to obtain, supporting private sector development and job creation where it is needed most.”
IFC works closely with Finland to provide financing and advice to promote private sector development in emerging markets. Most recently, IFC and Finnfund co-invested in three solar projects to support renewable energy development in the Middle East. IFC and Finnfund also jointly invested in power companies in Bangladesh and Kenya to increase access to electricity in these countries.
About IFC
IFC, a member of the World Bank Group, is the largest global development institution focused exclusively on the private sector. Working with private enterprises in about 100 countries, we use our capital, expertise, and influence to help eliminate extreme poverty and boost shared prosperity. In FY14, we provided more than $22 billion in financing to improve lives in developing countries and tackle the most urgent challenges of development. For more information, visit
www.ifc.org
.
About Finnfund
Finnfund is a Finnish development financier that provides long-term risk capital for private projects in developing countries. We fight poverty through environmentally sound investments, focusing mostly on renewable energy, forestry and energy efficiency. We often work with other development financiers and with Finnish companies. Since 1980 Finnfund has made nearly 400 investments in more than 50 countries. Today we have approximately 470 million euros invested in or committed to 146 projects in 32 countries. For more information, visit
www.finnfund.fi
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