BAKU, Azerbaijan, January 23. The Azerbaijan Entrepreneurship Development Fund under the Ministry of Economy financed 2,726 investment projects in 2022, Trend reports via the fund.
Last year, the fund has issued concessional loans with a total amount of 145.9 million manat ($85.8 million).
Out of the issued loans, 87.1 million manat ($51.2 million) accounted for the manufacturing of agricultural products, 37.3 million manat ($21.9 million) - for manufacturing and processing of industrial products, 9.1 million manat ($5.3 million) – tourism, and 12.4 million manat ($7.29 million) - other industries.
Azerbaijan's Bank Respublika JSC ranked first in terms of concessional loans issued to businesses last year.
The bank issued concessional loans worth 28.3 million manat ($16.6 million) to entrepreneurs in 2022, which is 39.4 percent higher than in 2021.
Kapital Bank ranked second (15.6 million manat, or $9.1 million), and RabitaBank took third place (14.8 million manat, or $8.71 million).
The top five also included PASHA Bank (13.2 million manat, or $7.76 million) and Xalq Bank (9.9 million manat, or $5.82 million).
According to the fund, the top five financial organizations in terms of the number of issued concessional loans included: Bank Respublika - 746, Yelo Bank - 350, Unibank - 318, Rabitabank - 282, and "Aqrarkredit" NBCO (non-banking credit organization) - 282.
In 2021, the fund issued concessional loans worth 287.7 million manat ($169.2 million) for the implementation of 1,902 projects.
The Azerbaijan Entrepreneurship Development Fund public entity was established under the Ministry of Economy and the “Procedures for use of the funds of the Entrepreneurship Development Fund of the Republic of Azerbaijan” was approved by the Decree of the President of the Republic of Azerbaijan on “Improvement of the state support mechanism for entrepreneurship development in the Republic of Azerbaijan” dated July 31, 2018, in order to improve the support mechanism for entrepreneurship development, create new production and processing enterprises based on innovative technologies in the non-oil sector, ensure the financing of export operations, accelerate investments in the real sector and expand access to financial resources of business units operating in the private sector.
