April 6, 2020 The European Commission has unlocked €1 billion from the European Fund for Strategic Investments (EFSI) that will serve as a guarantee to the European Investment Fund (EIF), part of the European Investment Bank Group. This will allow the EIF to issue special guarantees to incentivise banks and other lenders to provide liquidity to at least 100,000 European SMEs and small mid-cap companies hit by the economic impact of the coronavirus pandemic, for an estimated available financing of...

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April 2, 2020 Highlights • Financing is guaranteed by the European Fund for Strategic Investments (EFSI) and will help make the sector more resilient in light of Covid-19 • New financing targets investments by private cooperatives and companies in the agriculture and bioeconomy sector • The EIB programme loan will amount to €700 million and is expected to back close to €1.6 billion of investment across Europe The European Investment Bank (EIB), the EU bank, announced the launch of a new financing initiative that aims...

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Saving lives and supporting livelihoods in these times of acute crisis is paramount. The Commission is further increasing its response by proposing to set up a €100 billion solidarity instrument to help workers keep their incomes and help businesses stay afloat, called SURE. It is also proposing to redirect all available structural funds to the response to the coronavirus. Farmers and fishermen will also receive support, as will the most deprived. All of these measures are based on the current...

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April 2, 2020 Find out what the European Institutions are doing to mitigate the impact of the Covid19 outbreak, protect people and the economy and promote solidarity. 1. Slowing the spread of the virus To help limit the transmission of the virus in Europe and beyond, the EU has closed its external borders to non-essential travel, while ensuring essential goods keep moving across the EU through the introduction of green lanes. Additional resources are foreseen for the European Centre for Disease Prevention...

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March 31, 2020 Today we face economic upheaval potentially more severe than we witnessed during the global financial crisis. The coronavirus pandemic is a different kind of shock. Never before have modern economies shut down at the drop of a hat. From one week to the next, many workers lost their jobs and paychecks. Restaurants, hotels, and airplanes all emptied. And consumers and businesses now face steep losses in income—and potentially widespread bankruptcies. Pressure on the banking system is growing and higher...

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Efforts to contain virus and save lives should be intensified, and governments should plan stronger, more co-ordinated measures to absorb growing economic blow. Increasingly stringent containment measures, needed to slow the spread of the Coronavirus (Covid-19), will necessarily lead to significant short-term declines in GDP for many major economies, according to new OECD projections. OECD Secretary General Angel Gurría, in preparation for the G20 Virtual Summit that took place yesterday, unveiled the latest OECD estimates showing that the lockdown will directly affect sectors...

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March 31, 2020 • The IMF’s Executive Board has approved a framework for a new round of bilateral borrowing, to succeed agreements currently in place through end-2020 • This action is part of a broader package on IMF resources and governance reform that will help maintain the IMF’s lending capacity of $1 trillion • These are critical steps to ensure that the IMF can support its membership through the global pandemic now unfolding and beyond. Washington, DC – The IMF Executive Board approved yesterday a...

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30 March 2020 Today, the Commission has issued new practical advice to ensure that mobile workers within the EU, in particular those in critical occupations to fight the coronavirus pandemic, can reach their workplace. This includes but is not limited to those working in the health care and food sectors, and other essential services like childcare, elderly care, and critical staff for utilities. Together with the Guidance on the implementation of the temporary restriction on non-essential travel to the EU also issued...

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30 March 2020 | 13:15 The EU is taking swift action to make available money to help tackle the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic. The Council today adopted two legislative acts to quickly release funding from the EU budget for tackling the COVID-19 crisis. One of the acts amends the rules of the structural and investment funds, while the other extends the scope of the EU Solidarity Fund. The Coronavirus Response Investment Initiative will give member states access to €37 billion of cohesion money to strengthen healthcare systems,...

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