Projects

This project aims to set up a Regional Fund to provide Central American Integration System (SICA) countries with funds to run projects that both address and prevent natural disasters.

The EU is partnering with CABEO towards the setup of a Regional Fund to fight the region's vulnerability to climate change. These investments contribute to the mitigation of the impact by extreme events, while improving capacity to deal with climate change. For these reasons, the Fund serves as a catalyst to ensure focused action is maintained at national and international levels.

More specifically, the Fund aims to help build SICA countries’ capacities in the development of viable climate change projects by providing technical assistance for project preparation. It does so by facilitating:

  • Climate risk assessment and studies for the development of disaster warning, monitoring and alert systems.
  • Preparation of relevant studies for projects and identification of environm...
Sector: General Environment Protection    |   Projected total investment size: € 1 705 000 000    |   EU contribution: € 4 925 000
Dates: Dec/2021 - Dec/2026    |   Status: ONGOING    |   Countries: Belize, Dominican Republic, Colombia, Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua, Panama

 

LAGREEN is the first green bonds fund dedicated to Latin America. Its main purpose is twofold: to finance climate- and resource-friendly investments and to mobilise local and international private capital towards the issuance of more green bonds in Latin America.

LACIF is partnering with KfW to achieve the following objectives:

  • to mobilise additional funding for Nationally Determined Contributions (NDC) implementation;
  • to push local capital market development towards a transition to sustainable finance – thereby fostering transparency and long-term commitments in financial and economic activity;
  • to reach a substantial greenhouse gas emissions mitigation and/or climate change adaption impact.
Sector: Banking and financial services    |   Projected total investment size: € 155 450 000    |   EU contribution: € 16 050 000
Dates: Dec/2020 - Dec/2035    |   Status: ONGOING    |   Countries: Dominican Republic, Bolivia, Brazil, Colombia, Costa Rica, Ecuador, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Mexico, Nicaragua, Peru

The TIF Program has a three-pillar framework (financial, social and environmental, known as Triple Bottom Line) and a twofold objective: downscaling financial services -being more inclusive and tackling the bottom of the pyramid- and promoting climate-smart finance. 

The TIF Program, led by COFIDES, aims at bringing together the tools, actors and financing necessary to improve access to finance for low-income populations whilst reducing climate risk and vulnerability, especially in the case of smallholder farmers. More specifically, this initiative seeks to reduce climate risk in lending portfolios of Financial Service Providers and scaling up climate-smart lending, especially to urban and rural micro, medium and small-sized enterprises with no or limited access to the formal financial sector, including also small to medium and smallholder farmers.

TIF provides support to Financial Service Providers serving MSMEs through the provision of long-term loans (Debt Facili...

Sector: Banking and financial services    |   Projected total investment size: € 68 000 000    |   EU contribution: € 6 050 000
Dates: Oct/2020 - Oct/2025    |   Status: ONGOING    |   Countries: Colombia, Costa Rica, Ecuador, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua, Panama, Peru

The aim of the Facility is to establish a strategic partnership between the European Commission, AECID and other LACIF-assessed financial institutions, to channel the Commission’s resources towards the identification and design of projects aimed at increasing the sustainability and resilience of cities in Latin America. The strategic Facility finances project identification activities and the different steps leading to the design of comprehensive investment projects, capacity building activities and knowledge management, to build up bankable projects.

Sector: Urban development    |   Projected total investment size: € 6 200 000    |   EU contribution: € 5 200 000
Dates: Dec/2019 - Dec/2025    |   Status: ONGOING    |   Countries: Brazil, Colombia, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Mexico, Peru

The Seed Capital Risk Financing component for the Dinamica initiative addresses the bottlenecks identified in the Central American region, specifically regarding the accessibility of new and innovative enterprises to finance solutions in order to start their operations, be consolidated and grow. 

The project, implemented by KfW and CABEI, provides vital start capital as contingent grants which is complemented by technical assistance for capacity building to Financial Intermediaries and MSMEs. 

By doing this, the component contributes to developing entrepreneurship and innovation and is therefore an ideal complement to the DINAMICA I initiative. The project promotes equitable socio-economic development and stimulates employment in the private sector. 

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Sector: Support to SMEs    |   Projected total investment size: € 75 290 000    |   EU contribution: € 12 350 000
Dates: Dec/2018 - Dec/2027    |   Status: ONGOING    |   Countries: Dominican Republic, Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua, Panama

The Green MSMEs lnitiative aims at reducing carbon emissions in the Central American Region by ensuring the provision of financial and non-financial services to support renewable power generation and energy efficiency measures in Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises. In order to do so, the lnitiative contains three main components:

  • Technical Assistance for MSMEs as well as Participating Financial lntermediaries,
  • Partial Risk Guarantees for MSMEs,
  • Financing (loans) for Environmental lnvestments for MSMEs.

This lnitiative represents a continuation of the "Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy programme for SME in Central America". The mentioned Program was successfully implemented and the achievements and lessons learnt constituted the basis for this Initiative implemented by KfW and CABEI.

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Sector: Support to SMEs    |   Projected total investment size: € 62 480 000    |   EU contribution: € 14 380 000
Dates: Dec/2018 - Dec/2034    |   Status: ONGOING    |   Countries: Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua, Panama

The eco.business Fund is a joint initiative of investors intent on supporting the promotion of business and consumption practices that contribute to biodiversity conservation, the sustainable use of natural resources, climate change mitigation and adaptation to its impact. In providing financing to the Fund’s target group for investing in activities that conserve nature and foster biodiversity, the eco.business Fund seeks investments that yield both financial and environmental returns. The financing can be provided directly or through local financial institutions. In addition, final beneficiaries and local lending institutions can count on high impact technical assistance provided by the eco.business Development Facility. The project is led by KfW and managed by Finance in Motion.

Sector: Support to SMEs    |   Projected total investment size: € 664 588 015    |   EU contribution: € 16 410 000
Dates: Dec/2016 - Feb/2033    |   Status: ONGOING    |   Countries: Brazil, Colombia, Costa Rica, Ecuador, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Mexico, Nicaragua, Panama, Peru

The Western Corridor is part of the main road network of Honduras and it is integrated into the International Mesoamerican Road Network. This corridor connects the second biggest city of the country, San Pedro Sula, in the north-western part of the country with the international border crossings with Guatemala and El Salvador, and with the Mayan ruins of Copán. LACIF supported EIB and CABEI in this project that comprised the rehabilitation and upgrading and road safety improvements of the Western Corridor. 

Sector: Transport    |   Projected total investment size: € 169 350 000    |   EU contribution: € 10 350 000
Dates: Dec/2015 - Jan/2023    |   Status: COMPLETED    |   Countries: Honduras

The Geothermal Development Facility for Latin America aims at overcoming existing barriers to the development of geothermal energy by providing: (i) a tailored Geothermal Risk Mitigation Fund in order to diminish geothermal resource risk during the exploratory drilling stage of the project; (ii) geothermal investment financing windows to deliver anchor financing for subsequent investments during the production drilling and construction stages; and (iii) a Technical Assistance Forum to offer a suitable venue for policy dialogue between donors and partner governments. The project is led by KfW and counts with the support from the European Union through LACIF, and from BMZ.

Sector: Sustainable energy    |   Projected total investment size: € 71 000 000    |   EU contribution: € 20 500 000
Dates: Dec/2014 - Dec/2026    |   Status: ONGOING    |   Countries: Bolivia, Chile, Colombia, Ecuador, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Mexico, Nicaragua, Peru

The LACIF contribution to this AECID-led initiative aims to improve water and sewerage infrastructures and contribute to reducing the risk of diseases caused by deficient water management in the Latin American region through the development of various projects. These are grouped into two components: Component I, projects for adaptation to climate change (ACC) and Component II, projects for the integrated management of water resources.

The projects include the reinforcement of capacities associated with the programs; studies developed in the pre-investment phase to identify new investments in new actions; review of regulations and the development of methodologies, tools and manuals which have an impact on future investments.

Sector: Water supply & sanitation    |   Projected total investment size: € 883 300 000    |   EU contribution: € 15 300 000
Dates: Dec/2013 - Dec/2024    |   Status: ONGOING    |   Countries: Argentina, Bolivia, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Ecuador, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Mexico, Nicaragua, Panama, Paraguay, Peru, Uruguay, Venezuela

DINAMICA focused on promoting entrepreneurial and private sector development for employment and income generation in order to contribute to economic development and poverty reduction in Central America. More specifically, the project, which was led by KfW and implemented by CABEI, aimed at:

  • Promoting the entrepreneurial environment in order to facilitate the creation of new and innovative enterprises;
  • Supporting financial sector development in order to provide adequate access to finance for MSMEs.
Sector: Support to SMEs    |   Projected total investment size: € 53 106 496    |   EU contribution: € 3 952 000
Dates: Dec/2013 - Sep/2022    |   Status: COMPLETED    |   Countries: Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua, Panama

The overall objective of the Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy Program for SMEs in Central America was to contribute to the protection of the climate and the environment. LACIF supported  KfW and CABEI at providing efficient and sustainable access to financing products for environmental investments which correspond to the needs of SMEs in Central America. The Program had two main components:

1) Financing of environmental investments – Provision of funds by the Program Executing Agency, CABEI, to local financial institutions that channel resources to SMEs for energy efficiency (EE) and renewable energy projects.  

2) Technical Assistance, studies and promotional activities – Including technical assistance for financial institutions, energy audits of SMEs and feasibility studies of small renewable energy projects; information material and promotional events.

Sector: Support to SMEs    |   Projected total investment size: € 36 639 743    |   EU contribution: € 3 000 000
Dates: Nov/2010 - Dec/2016    |   Status: COMPLETED    |   Countries: Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua