Tunis, Tunisia, August 6, 2012—
IFC, a member of the World Bank Group, is making a local currency loan worth $7 million to Tunisian microfinance institution Enda Inter-Arabe to help the organization increase its lending to micro-enterprises, especially those owned by women, spurring economic development.
The dinar-denominated loan will contribute to Enda Inter-Arabe’s plans to reach out to 400,000 clients by end-2015, and to double its current loan portfolio to over $140 million. IFC will also help build Enda Inter-Arabe’s institutional capacity through a package of advisory services that include training in corporate governance and in risk management. Enda Inter-Arabe is presently Tunisia’s sole private microfinance institution and the majority of its clients are women.
"Our long partnership with IFC has helped us greatly in financing micro-projects all over the country, 70 percent of which are owned by low income women,” said Essma Ben Hamida, Enda Inter-Arabe Executive Director and Co-Founder. “Now, IFC’s advisory services package will help us transform from a non-government organization into a microfinance company, allowing us to reach even more people."
Since 2007, IFC has worked with Enda Inter-Arabe to provide small loans to entrepreneurs and micro-enterprises in Tunisia. Enda has 220,000 clients, up from 63,000 in 2007, and it has 67 branches across Tunisia.
"Micro and small businesses are a key driver of economic growth and sustainable development,” said Antoine Courcelle-Labrousse, IFC Country Manager in Tunisia. ”Our support to Enda Inter-Arabe will help generate jobs and provide more economic opportunities for women.”
IFC will provide Enda Inter-Arabe, whose portfolio stands at $80.6 million, with financing over five years. Such long-term financing has become difficult to mobilize in Tunisia, especially for NGOs. This investment is part of IFC’s efforts in Tunisia to create jobs, support women in business, help smaller companies and make the country’s economy more competitive.
About IFC
IFC, a member of the World Bank Group, is the largest global development institution focused exclusively on the private sector. We help developing countries achieve sustainable growth by financing investment, mobilizing capital in international financial markets, and providing advisory services to businesses and governments. In FY12, our investments reached an all-time high of more than $20 billion, leveraging the power of the private sector to create jobs, spark innovation, and tackle the world’s most pressing development challenges. For more information, visit
www.ifc.org
.
About Enda Inter-Arabe
Enda Inter-Arabe is the first MFI that introduced best practice microfinance to Tunisia in 1995. Since then it has disbursed over a million micro loans ($600 millions) reaching out to 350,000 low income micro-entrepreneurs in urban and rural Tunisia.
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