A total of 419 Serbian companies successfully invested through the program of the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD), with the financial support of the European Union (EU) and in cooperation with the Ministry of Economy. 107 million euros were secured through EBRD loans in that period, while the EU provided 9.5 million euros in incentive grants from national and regional pre-accession funds.
The SME competitiveness program has been implemented in Serbia since 2019, and is now in its final phase, according to a statement published by the European delegation in Serbia.
The program offers small and medium-sized enterprises access to EBRD loans and EU grants (15 percent of the loan amount) for investing in business improvement with the aim of reaching EU standards and increasing competitiveness.
The funds were placed through local commercial banks.
Today, a delegation of the EBRD, the European Union and the Ministry of Economy visited a company that participated in the program, namely MNG Plastik Gogić.
This private company, which produces plastic waste bins, buckets and seats for sports stadiums, invested in a centralized system for transferring raw materials from the silo to the production plant.
“With this investment, we have achieved greater productivity with significant reductions in waste and energy, but also improvements in terms of product quality and improvement of protection and safety at work.” We use over 15,000 tons of raw material every year, so even one percent savings means a lot to us. In any case, we planned this investment, but the good financing conditions and the grant we received through this program still meant something to us”, says Goran Gogić, co-owner of the company.
As much as 90 percent of companies financed through the program are located outside of Belgrade, where access to financing for companies is often even more difficult.
Most of the investments were in the manufacturing, transportation, agriculture, retail and services, construction, food and beverage manufacturing sectors.
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