EBRD upbeat on Lebanon, seeks continued reform
beirut — The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) sees enormous prospects in Lebanon, but potential investors need to see progress on reform and, over the border, a process towards a settlement of Syria’s war, the bank’s president said.
On his first visit since the EBRD began operating in Lebanon in September, EBRD president Suma Chakrabarti said he saw a role for the bank in financing small and medium-sized enterprises and renewable energy, energy efficiency and infrastructure projects.
On Thursday Lebanon agreed its first two EBRD deals: a 2.51 per cent equity investment in Lebanon’s largest lender Bank Audi and a $50 million trade finance line with Fransabank, the third-largest. “I think the prospects for the EBRD in Lebanon are enormous,” he told Reuters, and added that the bank has not set an upper limit on investment in Lebanon. “It depends on the demand we get from private sector players.”
While the war in Syria continues, Lebanon’s biggest challenge will remain regional risk.
Set up by governments in 1991 to invest in the ex-communist economies of eastern Europe and owned mainly by developed countries, the EBRD has expanded its mandate in the last decade to operate in almost 40 countries.
Lebanon joins Egypt, Jordan, Morocco and Tunisia in the EBRD’s southern and eastern Mediterranean (SEMED) region, where it has invested more than €6.5 billion ($8 billion) in 170 projects since 2012.—