The BGFIBank Group and the African Guarantee Fund (AGF) Group signed on Friday August 12, 2022 in Libreville, a portfolio guarantee line for a total amount of 50 million Euros, intended to cover loans granted to SMEs.
This new agreement will enable the BGFIBank Group, which is present in several financial businesses and has strong pan-African roots, through its various subsidiaries, to accelerate access to financing for SME customers, a real lever for the development of African economies.
The partnership agreement was signed by Mr. Henri-Claude OYIMA, Chairman and Managing Director of the BGFIBank Group and Mr. Jules NGANKAM, Managing Director of the African Guarantee Fund Group, in the presence of all the Top Management of the BGFIBank Group and the AGF Group.
During this signing ceremony, the Chairman and CEO, Mr. Henri-Claude OYIMA, declared: “For the BGFIBank Group, this partnership is in line with the ambitions of our DYNAMIC 2025 Company project which advocates, among other , financial inclusion, which involves increasing the SME segment in the overall loan portfolio. A vector of development and added value for the African continent, the growth of a solid and prosperous SME fabric is an opportunity for us, and inevitably involves the implementation of synergies between reference partners in order to overcome the challenges that pose the financing of this specific clientele. The partnership that we are forging today with the AGF opens a new era in many respects”.
For his part, Mr. Jules NGANKAM, welcomed the consolidation of the relationship between the BGFIBank Group and the AGF Group in favor of SMEs in Africa. “The AGF Group and the BGFIBank Group have been collaborating for eight years and this new agreement demonstrates our desire to continue to support SMEs, major players in job creation in Africa. Furthermore, we consider women’s entrepreneurship as a pillar of economic growth. Thus, thanks to the AFAWA Guarantee for Growth program, implemented by the AGF in partnership with the African Development Bank (AfDB), the subsidiaries of the BGFIBank Group will support, under more advantageous conditions, SMEs of female entrepreneurship. said Mr. NGANKAM.
About BGFIBank Group
The BGFIBank Group is a multi-business International Financial Group that combines financial solidity, sustainable growth strategy and risk management, with the ambition to be the benchmark bank in its markets in terms of quality of service. Faithful to its values of Work, Integrity, Transparency, Responsibility and Team Spirit, the Group places quality of service at the heart of its business. It supports its individual, corporate and institutional clients in a lasting relationship, with a wide range of products and services.
The BGFIBank Group is constantly enriching its offer by relying in particular on the expertise of its partners, thus opening up to new areas. 2,441 employees in twelve countries provide daily support to a diversified clientele in Benin, Cameroon, the Central African Republic, Congo, Côte d’Ivoire, France, Gabon, Equatorial Guinea, Madagascar, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Sao Tome and Principe and Senegal.
About AFRICAN GUARANTEE FUND
African Guarantee Fund is a non-bank financial institution whose objective is to promote economic development, increase job creation and reduce poverty in Africa by providing financial institutions with guarantee solutions and support for the strengthening of capacities, specifically aimed at supporting SMEs in Africa.
African Guarantee Fund was created by the Government of Denmark through the Danish International Development Agency (DANIDA), the Government of Spain through the Spanish Agency for Cooperation and International Development (AECID) and the African Bank Development (ADB). The other shareholders are: the French Development Agency (AFD), the Nordic Development Fund (NDF), the Investment Fund for Developing Countries (IFU) and the KfW Development Bank.
AGF is rated AA- by Fitch Ratings. www.africanguaranteefund.com
About the African Women’s Access to Finance Initiative (AFAWA)
Baptized AFAWA by English acronym – for Affirmative Finance Action for Women in Africa – is a pan-African initiative of the African Development Bank, which aims to fill the financing gap that affects women in Africa, estimated at 42 billion dollars. AFAWA offers a multi-pronged approach to address the constraints women entrepreneurs face in Africa. In addition to taking advantage of all the Bank’s financial instruments, it offers a guarantee program for growth (G4G), exclusively dedicated to women’s businesses. It is a risk-sharing mechanism in partnership with the African Guarantee Fund and the Gender Equality Trust Fund to allocate grants for technical assistance and enabling environmental initiatives. The G4G is funded by the G7, the Netherlands and Sweden.
