With the aim of encouraging entrepreneurship and stimulating job creation and growth in Egypt, Morocco and Tunisia, the African Development Bank Group and the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) have officially launched & eacute; the work of a joint working group that they set up. The launch took place on Thursday, September 21, 2023, during a workshop at the African Development Bank's North Africa Regional Office in Tunis.

The working group will ensure that the two institutions jointly identify and implement innovative and operational initiatives to address the challenges faced in the development of SMEs. This work will focus on supporting the emergence of start-ups, businesses run by women and young people or operations that link the development of SMEs and start-ups to regional and local value chains. This is a joint “Task Force” on entrepreneurship and very small, small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) for an impact on employment in North Africa will act within the framework of the Partnership Agreement signed by the EBRD and the African Development Bank in May 2021