OREANDA-NEWS. April 29, 2008. SME Support provided by the Russian Bank for Development within the framework of the State Corporation “Bank for Development and Foreign Economic Affairs (Vnesheconombank)” will be enhanced significantly. RBD is developing new programs of entrepreneurs’ support taking into consideration both individual needs of small and medium-sized business and economic potential of the regions and their saturation with special bank lending programs, reported the press-centre of RBD.
 
Determination of priorities and development of SME support techniques is carried out as a result of SME survey accomplished jointly with “Deloitte&Touche” as well as the analysis of performance of international development institutions.
 
RBD in particular will continue to develop the network of regional counterparty banks in every member entity of the Russian Federation. At that the emphasis shall be made on partner agreements with credit organizations in the regions with low level of SME development and inadequate bank support to the given business area.
 
One of the RBD’s priorities is becoming financial support to organizations forming the infrastructure for SME. With the view to work out suitable models of cooperation the Bank is currently negotiating with special regional foundations.
 
Moreover RBD intends to introduce targeted credit products for companies whose requirements at present aren’t covered by commercial credit institutions on the ground of high cost of lending operations and high credit exposure. It in particular applies to organizations involved in SME micro-financing.
 
Apart from financial support RBD will multiply its activities in the area of methodological and consulting assistance to both SMEs and counterparty banks and organizations of infrastructure support to SME.
 
Simultaneously RBD will continue political dialog with governmental agencies and professional associations of SMEs. It is required for removal of legislative obstacles for entrepreneurship development in Russia, as well as for improvement of the federal and regional SME support programs.
 
Thus, recommendations and analytical data provided by “Deloitte&Touche” will help RBD specificate its SME medium-term support strategy, determine priorities of regional positioning of SME programs, insure differentiation of products and services and develop new targeted loan support programs.