A contract between the European Commission and NIB will release € 480 million in green investments.
The European Commission and the Nordic Investment Bank (NIB) have signed an InvestEU guarantee agreement worth up to € 114 million to unlock NIB financing of upto € 480 million for investments in sustainable infrastructure, research, innovation and digitalisation across the Nordic, Baltic countries and Poland.
InvestEU provides a European Union (E.U.) budgetary guarantee to implementing partners to increase their risk-taking capacity and therefore contributes to mobilizing public and private investment for the E.U.’s policy priorities.
With this agreement, NIB becomes an InvestEU implementing partner. This, in turn, would mobilise public and private investments of around € 2 billion in total. NIB will use this guarantee agreement to mobilise investments in clean energy, the modernization and decarbonization of industry, critical raw materials supply, sustainable transport, environmental protection, bioeconomy, digital connectivity and sustainable data infrastructure.
Speaking on the occasion, the Commissioner for the Economy, European Commission – Paolo Gentiloni, said, “InvestEU is a crucial tool in our efforts to advance successfully with the green and digital transitions of our economies. I am delighted that with this agreement the Nordic Investment Bank has become our implementing partner. Together, we can harness the full potential of InvestEU to channel investment towards green and digital projects, supporting sustainable growth and creating high-quality jobs across the Nordic and Baltic region.”
The President and CEO of NIB – André Küüsvek said, “The InvestEU guarantee agreement will help NIB to further mobilizing financing to the green transition, with a focus on renewable energy, energy efficiency, decarbonization of industry and the transport sector, but also on innovation and digitalisation. NIB’s strategy is geared towards taking more risk and lend more to small and medium-sized and mid-cap companies, and the EU guarantee is exactly the right tool that fits this strategy.”
It will also support investments in projects relating to the sustainable blue economy, space, critical infrastructure, health and the development of innovative technologies across a range of sectors. These investments will help the EU to achieve its broader strategic objectives of securing the green and digital transitions.
Presently, the E.U. guarantee under InvestEU can be used by NIB to support projects in Denmark, Estonia, Finland, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland and Sweden. The first operations under the agreement are expected to be approved over the course of 2023.
The InvestEU programme will provide the E.U. with crucial long-term funding by leveraging substantial private and public funds in support of a sustainable recovery. It will also help mobilise private investments for the E.U.’s policy priorities, such as the European Green Deal and the digital transition. The programme consists of three components: the InvestEU Fund, the InvestEU Advisory Hub, and the InvestEU Portal. The InvestEU Fund will be implemented through financial partners who will invest in projects using the EU budget guarantee of € 26.2 billion. The entire budgetary guarantee will back the investment projects of the implementing partners, increase their risk-bearing capacity and thus mobilise at least € 372 billion in additional investment.
