The International Finance Corporation (IFC), who are part of the World Bank Group has thus far invested $208 million into Ukraine since Vladimir Putin launched a full-scale war in 2022.
Over the next few months, the IFC could increase the amount to a total of $500 million as they are trying to “scale up” their presence.
IFC Vice President for Europe, Latin America and the Caribbean Alfonso Garcia Mora said, “We are trying to really escalate, scale up our presence, our investments. I think that we can be at $500 million in the next few months, with over $200 million plus what we have currently in the pipeline,” he said in an interview with Interfax-Ukraine.
“In the next 3-4 months, we have a pipeline of about $400 million. It will depend on the support from donors.”
Mora added, “IFC launched a $2 billion response package to support the Ukrainian private sector in mid-December. This is a package that will allow us to invest $2 billion in the next 18 months: $1 billion from IFC’s own account alongside $1 billion in guarantees and concessional finance from international donors.
“We are in the process of receiving increased support from international donors, which will allow us to do even more. But, as of now, we’re using our own funds. We have already significantly increased our presence, our investments without any guarantees or international support, in trade finance, the agribusiness sector, and in the high-tech sector.
“And we are now exploring other potential investments in the agribusiness sector, which we believe will be critical, and helping the banking sector to provide more financing services.”
He continued, “URTF is the trust fund the World Bank Trust established to support the public sector. What we are doing is to mobilize financial support from donors so we can channel it to the private sector.
“Normally, how it works is, that we can leverage each dollar a donor contributes up to four times, because we can mobilize and bring on board other investors that otherwise wouldn’t have.”
“The longer the invasion lasts, the longer we will need to continue focusing on this first phase and the later we will be able to move on to the reconstruction phase.
“So I think that’s the key thing. This won’t affect our commitment or negatively impact investment volumes. Of course, the moment the invasion is over, there will be a much bigger influx of capital into the country. But we will continue supporting the country even if it takes until 2025.”
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