Kenya - Equity Group Holdings Plc (AFDB-P-KE-HAB-030)

Countries
  • Kenya
Geographic location where the impacts of the investment may be experienced.
Financial Institutions
  • African Development Bank (AFDB)
International, regional and national development finance institutions. Many of these banks have a public interest mission, such as poverty reduction.
Project Status
Approved
Stage of the project cycle. Stages vary by development bank and can include: pending, approval, implementation, and closed or completed.
Bank Risk Rating
U
Environmental and social categorization assessed by the development bank as a measure of the planned project’s environmental and social impacts. A higher risk rating may require more due diligence to limit or avoid harm to people and the environment. For example, "A" or "B" are risk categories where "A" represents the highest amount of risk. Results will include projects that specifically recorded a rating, all other projects are marked ‘U’ for "Undisclosed."
Voting Date
Nov 28, 2019
Date when project documentation and funding is reviewed by the Board for consideration and approval. Some development banks will state a "board date" or "decision date." When funding approval is obtained, the legal documents are accepted and signed, the implementation phase begins.
Borrower
Equity Group Holdings Plc
A public entity (government or state-owned) provided with funds or financial support to manage and/or implement a project.
Sectors
  • Finance
The service or industry focus of the investment. A project can have several sectors.
Investment Amount (USD)
$ 52.70 million
Value listed on project documents at time of disclosure. If necessary, this amount is converted to USD ($) on the date of disclosure. Please review updated project documents for more information.
Currency conversion note:
Bank reported U.A 73,173,765
Converted using 2019-11-28 exchange rate.
Bank Documents
Primary Source

Original disclosure @ AFDB website

Updated in EWS Jun 14, 2020

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Project Description
If provided by the financial institution, the Early Warning System Team writes a short summary describing the purported development objective of the project and project components. Review the complete project documentation for a detailed description.

The proposed project relates to the provision of USD 100 million subordinated debt funding, tier II qualifying debt, to Equity Group Holdings Plc (EGH). It seeks to enhance the borrower's capacity to expand its lending activities to MSMEs and local corporates across various countries in Africa. The subdebt will have a tenor of eight years inclusive of a grace period of five years in order to align with tier II qualifications as guided by Central Bank of Kenya Prudential Guidelines. The subdebt will bolster EGH's interventions in key sectors including agriculture, manufacturing and trade across countries of operation through its prowess of delivering funding to otherwise financially excluded business segments/ groups such as MSMEs, women and youth. EGH was initially known for its lending to SMEs and its focus on this business segment at a time when hitherto mainstream lenders were downsizing and scaling down on SME lending. EGH has widened its coverage to include micro enterprises as evidenced by its service offering to the unbanked in camps for internally displaced persons and refugees in Uganda, Rwanda and Kenya.

The purpose of the project is to facilitate the regional expansion of the Equity Group Holdings Plc ("EGH") with a view to expanding its support to Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (MSMEs) businesses across East, Central and Southern Africa, contributing to regional integration, industrialization, job creation and inclusive growth.

The direct beneficiary of the intervention is the EGH. Indeed, the facility will complement the support of the African Development Bank (AfDB) to EGH in the form of long-term project financing through the Kenyan subsidiary. The facility will also improve the provision of long-term financing to worthy market segments, including MSMEs, women and young people.

Investment Description
Here you can find a list of individual development financial institutions that finance the project.

Contact Information
This section aims to support the local communities and local CSO to get to know which stakeholders are involved in a project with their roles and responsibilities. If available, there may be a complaint office for the respective bank which operates independently to receive and determine violations in policy and practice. Independent Accountability Mechanisms receive and respond to complaints. Most Independent Accountability Mechanisms offer two functions for addressing complaints: dispute resolution and compliance review.

private-sector@afdb.org

ACCOUNTABILITY MECHANISM OF AfDB

The Independent Review Mechanism (IRM), which is administered by the Compliance Review and Mediation Unit (CRMU), is the independent complaint mechanism and fact-finding body for people who have been or are likely to be adversely affected by an African Development Bank (AfDB)-financed project. If you submit a complaint to the IRM, it may assist you by either seeking to address your problems by facilitating a dispute resolution dialogue between you and those implementing the project and/or investigating whether the AfDB complied with its policies to prevent environmental and social harms. You can submit a complaint electronically by emailing crmuinfo@afdb.org, b.kargougou@afdb.org, b.fall@afdb.org, and/or s.toure@afdb.org. You can learn more about the IRM and how to file a complaint at https://www.afdb.org/en/independent-review-mechanism/.

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