MD Second Competitiveness Enhancement Project

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The development objective of the Second Competitiveness Enhancement Project for Moldova is to increase the export competitiveness of Moldovan enterprises and decrease the regulatory burden faced. The project comprises of four components. The first component, regulatory reform objective is to support Government of the Republic of Moldova (GoM) in improving the business enabling environment in Moldova, and specifically in implementing its regulatory reform strategies over the next five years. It consists of following two sub-components: (i) reform governance and capacity building; and (ii) reform implementation support. The second component, small and medium enterprise (SME) development aims to strengthen Moldovan SMEs' linkages to markets and ability to compete in those markets through two closely related aspects: strengthening the institutional capacity of organization for the development of small and medium enterprises (ODIMM) and Moldovan investment and export promotion agency (MIEPO), and providing matching grants to SMEs. It consists of following two sub-components: (i) institutional strengthening; and (ii) matching grant facility. The third component, access to finance objectives are to improve access to medium to long-term finance for export-oriented enterprises, reduce barriers to finance due to perceived high credit risk in SME finance and high collateral requirements, and promote suitable models for value chain financing, particularly in the agriculture sector. The fourth component, project management will cover the project implementation unit's (PIU's) cost of managing component one and component two of the project, as well as activities that overlap with component three (for example, accountant, procurement specialist, etc.).