CAF to allocate USD 300 million to boost Pacific Alliance exporting SMEs
The CAF-led SME Productivity Support Program calls for channeling financial resources, capacity building for businesses, technical assistance and knowledge transfer, among other initiatives to boost integration and economic development in the Pacific Alliance countries.
CAF—development bank of Latin America—presented its SME Productivity Support Program for members of the Pacific Alliance, which focuses on boosting the bloc’s export activity with up to USD 300 million, to be channeled through commercial banking in the 4 countries, in order to offer fresh capital to projects that aim to tap into new international markets and leverage trade integration efforts of their governments.
CAF executive president Luis Carranza announced during his speech at the 14th Pacific Alliance Summit in Lima, Peru, that the Program focuses on channeling financial resources through intermediaries in commercial banking, national development banks, and other partners, for the financing of SMEs that have concrete projects of internationalization and tapping into foreign markets, innovation in products, services and processes, or that wish to effectively integrate into regional and international value chains and clusters.
“We share with Pacific Alliance countries a strategic interest in SMEs as key players in the process of economic integration and development; thus, we want to promote their productivity through innovative financial instruments and consolidate as the development bank for SMEs in Latin America,” Carranza added.
The program is promoted by CAF’s Vice-Presidency of the Private Sector and also includes activities for capacity building of businesses, with support from advocacy agencies and public and private entities in each country, technical assistance to financial intermediaries to adapt their financial risk management processes and mechanisms, which are integrated to ensure safety and efficiency of SME project funding.
These initiatives are part of CAF’s multi-year support to the group’s efforts to remove barriers to integration and export promotion, with actions on the different items of the Pacific Alliance agenda, such as trade facilitation and customs cooperation, digital agenda, single foreign trade windows, business development centers for SMEs, among others.
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