Brussels, 27/06/2016 (Agence Europe) - Despite the current stormy news, the Commission is gearing up to present a financing guarantee worth €121 million for the cultural and creative sectors, on Thursday 30 June. It is subsequently hoping to generate bank loans worth a total amount of €600 million.
This initiative was announced by the Commissioner for the Digital Economy and Society, Gunther Oettinger, during the Cannes Festival in May 2016. Its aim is to enhance financing capacity for Small and Medium-Sized Enterprises (SMEs) in the cultural and creative sector, by providing assurances to financial intermediaries lending to these SMEs, through a guarantee that could cover up to 70% of each loan, as well as a 25% maximum on the amount of the portfolio guarantee. This will be done by way of a financial envelope worth €121 million from the Creative Europe Programme. It will also help these intermediaries to gain a better understanding of the specificities of the creative and cultural sectors through the implementation of a capacity enhancement programme.
The new SME risk-sharing instrument will be managed on behalf of the European Commission through the European Investment Fund (EFI), which is part of the European Investment Bank (EIB). It will benefit companies working in the cultural and creative sectors in countries participating in the Creative Europe Programme, if they are eligible under the terms of the definition of Small and Medium-Sized Enterprises. These sectoral activities are based on cultural values and/or artistic values and creative expressions, irrespective of whether these activities are orientated to the market or not and irrespective of the legal structure underpinning them. Such activities include the creation, production, broadcasting and preservation of goods and services representing cultural, artistic and creative expressions. These sectors include architecture, archives and libraries, art, audiovisual (including the cinema, television, video games and multimedia), cultural heritage, conceptualisation, festivals, music, performance arts, publishing, radio and the visual arts.
Current estimates suggest that without specific support measures, the financing deficit in this sector for the 2014-20 period could reach between €1.1 billion and €1.9 billion a year. The lack of guarantees could possibly be responsible for preventing between 280,000 to 476,000 SMEs in the sector obtaining loans from financial intermediaries.
The Commission is expecting the programme to generate €600 million in loans and other financial products by providing a catalyst in this connection. (Original version in French by Sophie Petitjean)