Demerara Bank clinches US$7M trade finance deal with IDB

Demerara Bank Limited (DBL) yesterday joined the Trade Finance Facilitation Programme (TFFP) of the Inter-American Develop-ment Bank (IDB) and will now have access to a US$7 million line of credit with which it can provide financing to a host of sectors, including the oil and gas industry and small businesses.

According to Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Pravinchandra Dave, the US$7 million first tranche, which has been released, will be used to diversify the sectors which can access loans and technical support from DBL for short-term international trade finance transactions. These sectors will now include the oil and gas industry as well as the forestry, mining and agriculture sectors.

“The facility will be extended to the small scale entrepreneurs, small businesses for pre-shipment facility, for post-shipment finance. There are a lot of suppliers of services to the oil and gas companies which are not able to provide the collateral to the bank and what we can do [is] we can create a charge over the receivables and we can provide the facility to them (customers),” he explained, following the signing at the bank’s Camp Street headquarters.