The Coega Development Corporation and Standard Bank have signed an agreement to help black economic empowerment companies awarded contracts by the CDC, to qualify for financial assistance.

“The basis of this agreement is the leverage of both our skills and resources to develop an appropriate and co-ordinated strategy in developing BEE opportunities for the benefit of those who were historically deprived of such opportunities,” the CDC’s acting chief executive, Khwezi Tiya, said of the agreement that was signed in Port Elizabeth last week.

Standard Bank has undertaken to grant loan facilities to BEE companies that comply with the bank’s SMME lending criteria, and to appoint staff to specifically evaluate and process applications from this sector. The CDC will provide the necessary support to the companies and share the risk with the bank.

Standard Bank’s Eastern Cape provincial director Hannah Sadiki said that through the successful implementation of the agreement, the CDC would give the bank a vehicle to start growing leading businesses of tomorrow, while at the same time growing the region’s economy in a part of the country with the greatest need.

“As a company, Standard Bank sees it as critical that it becomes relevant within the markets in which it operates, and in the Eastern Cape that means supporting SMMEs as well. That is something we would not be able to do on our own, unless organisations like the CDC gave us these opportunities,” said Sadiki.

The two parties will set up a joint committee to co-ordinate the implementation of the agreement, and monitor the flow of BEE transactions under the agreement and the service levels of both parties.