©Mercedes Landete/EIB

The EIB is to provide a EUR 25m loan to Bankia to promote the creation of jobs for young people in Spain. Bankia will add to the loan with up to EUR 25m with the same objective

The EU bank loan will make it possible to grant loans on favourable terms to SMEs giving jobs to unemployed young people

The agreement will help to promote youth employment and supplements the Dualiza Bankia professional training programme

The European Investment Bank (EIB) and Bankia are joining forces to combat youth unemployment in Spain. The two institutions today agreed to make EUR 50m available to Spanish SMEs and mid-caps to encourage them to give jobs to unemployed young people. To this end, the EIB has provided Bankia with a EUR 25m loan to which the Spanish bank can add up to an additional EUR 25m, bringing the maximum financing volume available to companies to EUR 50m.

Signed today in Madrid by EIB Vice-President Emma Navarro and Bankia Executive Chairman José Ignacio Goirigolzarri, the agreement was made possible by the support of the European Fund for Strategic Investments (EFSI). EFSI is the central pillar of the Investment Plan for Europe, known as the “Juncker Plan”. Its support enables the EIB Group to expand its capacity for financing investment projects with high added value that, as in the case of this agreement, aim to promote job creation, educational investment and business competitiveness.

At the signing ceremony in Madrid, EIB Vice-President Emma Navarro indicated that she was very pleased “with the signature of an agreement with Bankia to improve job opportunities for young people in Spain.” She also pointed out that “support for SMEs is one of the EIB's main priorities in Spain,” thereby recognising their role as drivers of economic growth and job creation.

Commissioner for Employment, Social Affairs, Skills and Labour Mobility, Marianne Thyssen said: “Thanks to EU support, such as the Youth Guarantee and Youth Employment Initiative, Spain has been investing a lot in job opportunities for young people. Since its launch, more than 1.3 million young people have registered under the Youth Guarantee in Spain, and about 1 million have participated in actions under the Youth Employment Initiative. I am delighted that Europe is now doing even more by mobilising private financing for strategic investments. Cooperation between the public and private sectors is important to be able to invest adequately in people. As such, the Juncker Plan plays a vital role in giving people a good start to their working life.”

Bankia Executive Chairman José Ignacio Goirigolzarri reiterated that this agreement “once again demonstrates Bankia's commitment to youth employment, where we aim to use all the tools at our disposal to tackle this social challenge. On the one hand, we are helping our unemployed young people to get jobs by providing the investment needed for businesses to place their trust in them. On the other, we are maintaining full support for professional training as a way to improve training and employability, via our Dualiza Bankia programme.”

SMEs and mid-caps giving jobs to unemployed young people using the EIB loan will be able to benefit from financing with lower interest rates and longer maturities, thanks to Investment Plan for Europe support.

Investing in the future: EIB support for education and training in the EU

Providing financing to promote investment in high quality education in the EU is a priority for the EIB Group. For the EU bank, today's students are tomorrow's innovators, making investment in education, human capital and training key to economic growth and job creation.

The EIB has been granting loans to finance education projects since 1997, when the European Council Resolution on growth and employment was adopted. In 2013, the Bank launched the Investing for Youth programme, an initiative aiming to foster youth employment by providing training resources. This initiative is financed via a EUR 6bn fund for projects developed between 2012 and 2020, and is primarily focused on supporting training programmes in EU regions with youth unemployment rates of over 25%.