Bank offers wide range of funding options

For bank President Harry Brautigam, Belize is a welcomed addition to the institution. And while he is glad to be working with Belize, Brautigam pointed out that Belmopan won’t be the only one benefiting from the bank’s growing resources.

Harry E. Brautigam, President, CABEI
?We are looking forward to this moment also because the bank has a series of programmes that we are able to support in financing micro-enterprises, financing small and medium enterprises, which we are now launching in Central America. As a bank, we are the main provider of financial resources to the financial sector in Central America and we expect to be able to continue doing so here as well, in Belize.?

?The four point five billion in assets that the bank has and the one point five billion in capital will be now at the orders for us to be able to support Belize in the areas that have been determined priority by the government and the areas where we have those abilities. We are looking forward also to work closely with the private sector to establish sessions of working, of how the private sector can access the resources that the bank has.?

Belize now joins Guatemala, Honduras, El Salvador, Nicaragua, and Costa Rica as members of CABEI. According to Brautigam, Panama and the Dominican Republic are expected to come onboard by the end of the year.

And in case you are wondering how we can even think about borrowing new money when we can’t repay our old debts, P.M. Musa says not to worry, they’ve got it covered.

Said Musa, Prime Minister of Belize
?In order to grow and to invest and to develop, we have to continue borrowing. The question is our capacity to be able to pay back, and that is why we are going through these debt re-arrangements. And so I have no doubts, we are doing things in a parallel way, twin track if you like, fixing the debt situation, making it more sustainable, but at the same time we have to continue to borrow to grow … and of course I must mention that the kind of loans provided by the Central American Bank for Economic Integration are very soft loans, very concessionary loans that the country would be able to benefit from.?

Kendra Griffith, Reporting
?On another topic, how are negotiations going with the creditors??

Said Musa
?They have been going very smoothly so far, but the final negotiations haven?t been undertaken yet. We expect that will happen beginning some time next month.?

Also present at the ceremony were Ministers Mark Espat and Ralph Fonseca.