HEMSO HEALTH AND OTHER COMMUNITY INFRASTRUCTURES

The project will finance the construction of health and education infrastructure in Sweden and Finland.

The project aims at providing new, state-of-the-art, elderly and preschool care facilities and schools. Such facilities will be constructed throughout Sweden and, to a lesser extent, in Finland.

The project supports increasing access to social infrastructure throughout Sweden and Finland by ensuring the funding of real estate projects with a particular focus on decentralized locations, selected based on the need and/or insufficient level of social services, such as care for the elderly or pre-school children, or educational infrastructure. The new and upgraded infrastructure financed by the EIB will ensure access to high quality care and state of the art learning environments. The provision of care and education as well as the investments targeting climate change mitigation, generate significant positive externalities, leading to an aggregate underinvestment relative to the levels that would be socially optimal. Therefore, the use of public financing is justified to address the investment gap. It is worth mentioning that this is the second operation with the promoter, who has a strong experience developing social infrastructure properties in Sweden and Finland. The operation will ensure that the promoter has sufficient financial resources for the timely implementation of the project; it will allow the promoter to spread out its investments and ensure that the tenor of the loan aligns with the economic life of the asset being financed.

EIB's financing is furthermore complementary to the other sources of financing accessible to the promoter. By providing a long term and flexible facility, the EIB is strengthening the capital structure of the promoter which is also to the benefit of private sector financiers.

Care and educational facilities are not specifically mentioned in the Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) Directive 2014/52/EU amending the EIA Directive 2011/92/EU, though the project is covered by Annex II of the Directive in relation to urban development. During appraisal the Bank's services will verify whether and in which sub-projects an EIA is required by the competent authority, as well as assessing full environmental details. The Promoter intends to further improve on the buildings' energy efficiency compared to the relevant national minimum (NZEB) standards.

The Promoter is a private company not operating in the utilities sector and not having a status of a contracting entity. Thus it is not covered by EU rules on procurement. However, if during the project appraisal, the EIB were to conclude that the Promoter is after all subject to EU public procurement legislation (Directive 2014/24/EU), then the Bank would require the Promoter to ensure that contracts for the implementation of the project will be tendered in accordance with the relevant applicable EU procurement legislation.