EBRD Syrian Refugee Response Programme

Description What is done in the programme or project and why, what results are pursued, who benefits from the activities and who are involved in the implementation.

EBRD (European Bank for Reconstruction and Development) aims at establishing democratic and market economies in transit countries. Finland has contributed to EBRD's SEMED MDA (South-Eastern Mediterranean Multi Donor Account) since 2011. The MDA implements technical assistance projects that support the bank's wider development investments in Egypt, Tunisia, Morocco, Jordan and Lebanon. EBRD has made it possible to contribute to the refugee response to support Syria's neighboring countries' resilience through the existing SEMED-MDA. This refugee response consists of 3 pillars: 1) Infrastructure development for host communities; 2) SME growth and small business support; 3) Economic inclusion and gender programme. According to the Annual Report 2017, a total of 93 technical cooperation projects have been financed and over 40 per cent of the EBRD's investment operations were benefited from MDA-funded technical cooperation. According to EBRD's result matrix the MDA has proved strongly catalytic: against every grant Euro the bank has mobilized 74 Euros in loans. EBRD estimates that in the infrastructure sub-sectors alone cumulative MDA-backed investments are expected to benefit a total of more than 115 million end-users. Additional contribution to the SEMED-MDA thus makes an efficient way for Finland to contribute more resources especially to support the Jordanian and Lebanese private sector in order to create more jobs and livelihoods to the refugees and host-community vulnerable alike.