MICROCAPITAL BRIEF: Agricover Credit IFN Borrows $18m from EIB to Expand Financial Access for Small, Medium-sized Farms in Romania

Recently, Agricover Credit IFN, a non-banking financial institution that specializes in financing agribusinesses in Romania, received a loan of EUR 7.5 million (USD 8.9 million) from the European Investment Bank (EIB), an entity of the EU. The agreement is designed to increase access to loans for small- and medium-scale farmers “to develop their farm activities in a sustainable way.” This is the second and final tranche of a loan agreement under which Agricover Credit IFN received an equal tranche from EIB in 2020.

Founded in 2007, Agricover Credit IFN is a subsidiary of Agricover Group, whose other members are Agricover SA, a distributor of agricultural technologies; Abatorul Peris, a meat processor; and Agricover Technology, a nascent effort to provide farmers with access to digital technologies. As of December 2020, Agricover Group was valued at RON 340 million (USD 81.4 million), and had generated profits during the year of RON 77.3 million (USD 18.5 million), employing 960 people. During the same year, Agricover Credit IFN disbursed loans totaling RON 1.6 billion (USD 380 million), generated profits of RON 42.1 million (USD 10.1 million) and employed 160 people. IFN is the Romanian acronym for non-banking financial institution.

EIB, founded in 1958, is “focused on innovation, SMEs [small and medium-sized enterprises], infrastructure and climate,” primarily in EU member states and potential future member states. In addition to funding, the institution assists its clients “in project implementation and the modernisation of public policies [via] technical and financial expertise and advisory services.” As of December 2020, its total assets amounted to EUR 554 billion (USD 675 billion) with disbursements during preceding year totaling EUR 58.3 billion (USD 71 billion).

By Teo Lin-Bianco, Research Associate

Sources and Additional Resources

EIB press release
https://www.eib.org/en/press/all/2021-270-agricover-credit-nfi-romania-eib-make-eur7-5-million-of-new-funds-available-to-agricultural-smes

Agricover Credit IFN webpage
https://agricover.ro/finantare/

Agricover Group homepage
https://agricover.ro/

Agricover Group financials 2020
https://bvb.ro/infocont/infocont21/AGV26E_20210610091305_EN-Agricover-Holding-annual-report-2020.pdf

EIB homepage
https://www.eib.org/

EIB financials 2020
https://www.eib.org/attachments/general/reports/eib_financial_report_2020_en.pdf

Previous MicroCapital news on EIB
https://www.microcapital.org/microcapital-brief-finnvera-to-issue-780m-in-pandemic-relief-loans-in-finland-with-75-guarantee-from-eib/

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