By Aygun Badalova - Trend:
European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) expects to invest some 1.5 billion euros in Turkey in 2014, bank's First Vice President Phil Bennett said at the opening of EBRD's new office in in the south-eastern city of Gaziantep (Turkey) on September 10.
He stressed that the EBRD has been growing rapidly since it first began investing in Turkey in 2009.
"Starting from just 150 million euros in the first year of our operations, we now expect to invest some 1.5 billion euros in 2014 and are aiming for between 1.8 and 2.0 billion euros in 2015", Bennett said. "Turkey is already our second most important recipient country and so far we have delivered total financing of over 3.8 billion euros across the country", he added.
Bennett said that the opening of EBRD's new office in Turkey is an important step for the bank as it marks bank's expansion into the Eastern Anatolian region. "We are looking forward to accelerating our operations here by drawing on the experience we have gained over five years of EBRD activities in the country", Bennett said.
The bank focuses on the sectors that remain key to the Turkish economy - agriculture, energy, infrastructure, the financial sector, and small and medium-sized enterprises, according to Bennett. Besides Gaziantep, the EBRD has two offices in Turkey, in Istanbul and Ankara. In just five years the EBRD's portfolio in Turkey has become one of the largest among the countries where the bank invests.