The EIB has presented the 2008 Investment Facility (IF) Annual Report to Ambassadors to the EU and Ambassadorial representatives from 30 African, Caribbean and Pacific (ACP) countries.

Philippe Maystadt, the EIB’s President, welcomed the visiting delegation, including members of the ACP Secretariat, headed by the Secretary General, Sir John Kaputin. In his opening statement, President Maystadt underlined the Bank’s reinforced commitment to the ACP regions and described the measures introduced in 2009 to ensure that projects of strategic importance can be successfully realised despite limitations on access to finance during the crisis. “No one will deny that we are currently navigating in particularly challenging economic and financial waters. The EIB, working alongside its partners, is willing to respond in developing countries including the ACP region.”

Whilst presenting the 2008 IF Annual Report to the Ambassadors, Plutarchos Sakellaris, EIB Vice President responsible for lending activities in the ACPs, took the opportunity to provide an EIB perspective on the upcoming revision of the Cotonou Agreement, the negotiation of which was launched on the occasion of June’s joint ACP-EU Council of Ministers in Brussels. “The challenges facing the EU-ACP Partnership have never been greater. This is an opportunity to show that our Partnership can rise to the challenge – that we are more than just “fair weather friends”. As the financing arm of the European Union, the EIB and its staff remain fully committed to continue the successful implementation of the Investment Facility and of its wider mandate in the ACP, in the wider pursuit of the aims of the EU-ACP Cotonou Agreement.”

The Chairman of the ACP Committee of Ambassadors, His Excellency Mr Joseph Ma’ahanua of the Solomon Islands, also addressed his peers confirming the need for ongoing close collaboration between the ACP countries and the EIB. In addition, the Ambassadors had the opportunity to meet with high-level EIB staff members with whom they discussed the individual needs of the ACP sub-regions and the specific countries represented.

The delegation took advantage of the Luxembourg meeting to visit the EIB’s new environmentally sustainable building which was inaugurated in June 2008, with a guided tour and a presentation by Alfonso Querejeta, the Bank’s Secretary General.

Background Notes:

EIB Activity in Africa, Caribbean and Pacific

The European Investment Bank (EIB) is instrumental in implementing the EU's development and economic cooperation policy in countries outside the Union. The EIB has been a development partner in many African, Caribbean and Pacific (ACP) countries since 1963 through a series of lending mandates from the European Council. The current mandate is based on the Cotonou Agreement of June 2000.

EIB loans in the ACP regions support the alleviation of poverty and the development of sustainable economic growth. The Bank lends from two sources - EIB own resources and the Investment Facility, a revolving fund financed by the EU Member States through the European Development Fund.