Jean-Pierre Jouyet, CEO of the Caisse des Dépôts Group and Philippe de Fontaine Vive Curtaz, Vice-President of the European Investment Bank (EIB), today confirmed their support for regional economic development with the signature of a cooperation agreement.
Fully consistent with the European Growth and Employment Pact adopted on 28 and 29 June 2012 by the EU’s Heads of State and Government, this cooperation aims to provide a concrete, tailored response to the major challenge of long-term financing of regional development projects and supplements the existing funding mechanisms, in particular the EUR 20 billion savings funds budget available to the local public sector over the period 2013-2017 whose terms of use have recently been eased.
Following the EUR 10 billion capital increase agreed by the Member States, the EIB’s Board of Directors approved on 18 December 2012 the 2013-2015 Corporate Operational Plan aimed at strengthening certain strategic objectives of the European Union by stepping up cooperation with the European Commission and other national long-term financing institutions in the Member States. For France, EUR 7 billion will be injected into the real economy each year, which will serve as a catalyst for the investment of more than EUR 42 billion in the private and public sectors.
Since the declaration of intent signed on 13 June 2013, the two institutions consulted to optimise, coordinate and take joint initiatives in support of lending to the local public sector in order to:
- identify investment projects in the eligible priority sectors by providing finance tailored to these projects in the long term;
- define common eligibility criteria and appraisal methods[1];
- develop types of funding adapted to their needs.
As part of a one-stop shop approach in support of financing for the local public sector, this cooperation has already been implemented in individual projects such as in the Rhône-Alpes region (SYANE’s very high-speed network in Haute-Savoie); the Basque country (waste treatment in Bil Ta Garbi) and the Provence-Alpes-Côte d’Azur region (the L2 bypass around Marseille).
It should be noted that the two institutions have already developed an operational partnership in respect of all public-private partnership appraisals in France concerning major projects such as LGV Bretagne-Pays de la Loire, the GSM network for railways, LGV Sud Europe Atlantique and the Nîmes-Montpellier rail bypass.
This cooperation was further developed in 2013 under two programmes in support of hospitals (potentially EUR 3 billion of loans) and universities (potentially EUR 2.6 billion of loans).
Apart from these initial operations, the two institutions aim to develop strong partnerships in the following sectors:
- hospital infrastructure;
- public buildings;
- deployment of very high-speed networks;
- high-quality urban transport;
- energy and environmental transition;
- infrastructure for recharging electric vehicles;
- urban development;
- social and solidarity economy.
This cooperation between the EIB and Caisse des Dépôts therefore fully ties in with the latter’s remits. Caisse des Dépôts’ regional focus, with 25 regional divisions in addition to the regional units of its subsidiaries, will be a major asset in the operational deployment of the European funds provided by the EIB.
Long-standing partners, particularly through the Long-Term Investors Club of which these two institutions are founding members, the creation of the multilateral investment funds Marguerite and InfraMed, and joint operations with savings funds for public-private partnership (PPP) financing of major projects (railways, universities, etc.), the EIB and Caisse des Dépôts are delighted with this new agreement, which will be a great boost for sustainable growth and job creation in France.
