EUROPEAN PROGRESS MICROFINANCE FACILITY
The European Progress Microfinance Facility (Progress Microfinance), launched in 2010, increases the availability of microcredit – loans below € 25 000 – for setting up or developing a small business. This initiative promotes employment and social inclusion through entrepreneurship and self-employment in Europe and is closely coordinated with existing instruments to support microfinance in the European Union.
Progress Microfinance does not directly finance entrepreneurs, but enables selected microcredit providers in the EU to increase lending, by:
1)issuing guarantees, thereby sharing the providers' potential risk of loss
2)providing funding to increase microcredit lending.
The microcredit providers may be private or public banks, non-bank microfinance institutions and not-for-profit microcredit providers. The conditions for microloans to entrepreneurs – amount, duration, interest rates and fees, timeframe to get a loan – depend on the particular microcredit provider. Find out more from the website and leaflet.
Progress Microfinance is supported by the European Commission and the European Investment Bank, and managed by the European Investment Fund.
JASMINE PROJECT
EIF provides Technical Assistance to selected microfinance institutions (MFIs) and micro-credit providers active in the European Union to increase the quality of their internal processes. JASMINE Technical Assistance services consist of:
- An institutional assessment or a rating exercise performed by Microfinanza Rating or Planet Rating.
- Tailor-made trainings to the staff and management of the selected MFI, delivered by experts from the Microfinance Centre, a network based in Poland and active in Asia, Africa and Europe on the other hand. The trainings are focusing on the weaknesses observed during the assessment / rating reports.
The Technical Assistance is financed by the European Commission, Directorate General for Regional Policy and it is free of charge to the beneficiary institutions.
The JASMINE (Joint Action to Support Microfinance Institutions in Europe) Project was launched in 2008 by the European Commission, the European Parliament and the European Investment Bank Group to develop microcredit in the EU. It comprises of a technical assistance program in addition to a funding facility. Microfinance Centre (MFC) is the implementing partner for this project.
