>@EIB/To be defined

The European Investment Bank (EIB) has granted a EUR 120 million loan to Spain’s Ministry of Agriculture, Food and the Environment in support of its 2013-2016 coastal and forestry protection programme. The loan agreement was signed today at the ministry’s headquarters in Madrid by Minister Miguel Arias Cañete and EIB Vice-President Magdalena Álvarez Arza.

The programme is aimed at improving Spain’s coasts and forests and will be implemented over the period 2013 to 2016. The EIB will finance in particular schemes involving the rehabilitation and protection of Spain’s coastline, the purchase of fire-fighting aircraft and the restoration of forests damaged by major fires.

At the signing ceremony, the EIB Vice-President said that “this operation is a further demonstration of the EIB’s support for Spain’s economy inasmuch as it will facilitate investment that gives a boost to economic activity and employment in a large number of Spanish municipalities while contributing to the protection of the country’s forests and coasts, which are among its key assets”.

This is the EIB’s first direct loan to the Ministry of Agriculture, Food and the Environment for financing Spain’s coastal and forestry protection programme.

Over the course of 2013, the EIB Group provided finance totalling EUR 71 700 million, mainly in the EU. In Spain, its lending reached a record EUR 10 656 million, making that country the biggest recipient of EIB funds for the tenth year running.