The issue of financing Ivorian small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) will be debated at the 4th edition of the "La Finance s'engage" initiative scheduled for November 21 in Abidjan, announced Thursday the president of the SME Development Commission and funding from the General Confederation of Businesses of Côte d'Ivoire (CGECI, Ivorian employers), Daouda Coulibaly.

"The 4th edition of the annual forum of the La Finance s'engage initiative will take place on Thursday, November 21, with the theme: support, the key to financing SMEs", declared Mr. Coulibaly during a ceremony of launch of this event.

In line with previous years, he explained, the forum will be a high-level meeting platform that will bring together key players in the financial and entrepreneurial ecosystem around SME financing.

"We can say that 4 years after the start of this adventure, the results are positive and the annual calendar of activities has been enriched again this year with the introduction of thematic workshops and the first regional workshop in Korhogo, introducing the initiative inside the country," added Daouda Coulibaly.

“This year, we have intensified our actions towards SMEs, after the first three years focused on mobilizing supply players,” recalled the president of the CGECI's SME Development and Financing Commission.

Regarding the results of the 2018 edition, he highlighted the organization of two thematic information workshops for SMEs, one with the BCEAO (Central Bank of West African States) and the other with the Ministry for the Promotion of SMEs which reached 500 SME actors.

Some 200 SME players were also brought together in Korhogo in the far north of the country as well as the start of a financing plan for certain key sectors in collaboration with the Caisse Nationale des Caisses d'Epargne (CNCE, public) .

"The financial education program initiated in 2018 continues and has been enriched with a follow-up part to the financing with the partner institutions of the initiative" concluded Daouda Coulibaly who had at his side the president of the Organizing Committee. of this forum, Victorine Attia and Teddy Roux, West Africa Director of the firm ESPartners co-organizer of the event.

The financing needs of Ivorian SMEs amount to approximately 3600 billion CFA francs. The 2019 edition of "La Finance s'engage" will also be furnished with an awards ceremony which will reward banks, microfinance institutions and financial establishments which have respected their commitments in favor of SMEs.

"La finance s'engage" is an initiative which aims to mobilize all the key players in the financial environment in Côte d'Ivoire in order to reflect on the financing of SMEs.

This forum is an institutionalized annual meeting, where traditional, alternative, state and private financing players publicly commit to amounts and programs with a strong impact on the financing of the private sector, and in particular of SMEs.