EBRD reports record 2020 investment in response to Covid-19

The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) responded to the coronavirus pandemic with record investment of €11 billion in 2020 through 411 projects, addressing the urgent needs of the 38 economies where it invests. This represents a 10 per cent increase in annual business investment relative to 2019, when the Bank provided €10.1 billion to finance 452 projects.

EBRD President Odile Renaud-Basso said: “The Bank put in an impressive performance and delivered on its promise to help our countries and clients deal with the economic impact of the Covid-19 pandemic. Our investments were sharply higher than the year before and we also provided policy support to help the private sector through the crisis.”

Keeping vital trade flows going, the EBRD supported a new record of 2,090 trade finance transactions worth EUR 3.3 billion under its Trade Facilitation Programme, involving 90 issuing and 140 confirming banks across 40 countries worldwide.

In addition to its own funds, the EBRD also directly mobilised EUR 1.2 billion from co-investors at a time when the global economy was suffering its most severe slump since the Great Depression of the 1930s. The Bank continued to concentrate its support on the private sector, which accounted for 72 percent of total EBRD investment last year.

In central and eastern Europe, Warsaw joined the Bank’s flagship Green Cities urban sustainability programme and, as a first project, received a joint EUR 87.2 million-equivalent loan from the EBRD and ING for the acquisition of new metro trains. The Bank also intensified its engagement in green energy with five major new renewables projects in carbon-intensive Poland.

The Green Cities programme continued to grow rapidly and reached 44 municipalities across the EBRD regions by the end of the year. Responding to high levels of demand, the Bank’s Board of Directors approved a doubling of financing so that the programme now commands more than €2 billion of funding.