LAAD is founded in 1969 by a group of leading international agribusiness and financial companies to finance exporting private agribusiness SMEs in Latin American countries.

LAAD has 12 shareholders, each holding an equal stake in the company (8.3%). LAAD’s shareholders are: Bank of America, Hexion Specialty Chemicals Inc., Cargill Inc., Deere and Company, DEG, Dole Fresh Fruit International, JPMorgan Chase and Co., Monsanto Company, Gerber (Nestle), Rabobank Curacao N.V., The Goodyear Tire and Rubber Company and Unilever Latin America.

Total project cost and IFC’s investment is $20 million, which will be invested in the form of an A loan and equity for IFC’s own account.

20.0 million (USD)

Product Line	IFC Investment (million USD)
Risk Management
Guarantee
Loan	16.50
Equity	3.50

* These investment figures are indicative

LAAD is incorporated in Panama and head-quartered in Miami. LAAD operates in 15 Latin American countries: Brazil, Ecuador, Dominican Republic, Chile, Costa Rica, Honduras, Bolivia, Guatemala, Peru, Uruguay, Colombia, Nicaragua, Venezuela, Belice and El Salvador. The investment proceeds will be distributed throughout the countries where it operates.

The project will strengthen access to medium and long term capital to players of a size and in an industry that traditionally have limited access to adequate funding. IFC will also help scale up LAAD, a successful financial intermediary that is continuing its regional diversification throughout Latin America, thereby contributing to the development of financial access throughout the region.

The monitorable indicators of the development impact of the project will be:
- financial return and economic return;
- loan portfolio growth;
- non-performing assets;
- number and amount of disbursements;
- number of permanent and seasonal jobs created by LAAD’s sub-projects; and
- environment compliance monitoring.

Without the IFC financing, LAAD would not be able to extend credits beyond 5 years to its clients. The IFC loan allows LAAD to better manage its assets/liability match, and provide adequate maturities to some projects with longer term pay back. Since LAAD is working with IFC, LAAD has been applying IFC’s Environmental & Social guidelines to its entire portfolio, not only those that are financed by IFC, thereby going beyond compliance.

This project has been classified as a category Financial Institution (FI) project according to IFC’s environmental & social review procedure. IFC has analyzed the activities proposed by the company with IFC financing and has determined that the applicable requirements would include a combination of

- the IFC exclusion list;
- the applicable national laws and regulations where funding takes place; and
- the IFC performance standards.

From the appraisal, IFC is satisfied with the capacity of the company to identify and appropriately address environmental & social risks. The company will need to enhance its Social and Environmental Management System (SEMS) to accommodate IFC’s current Performance Standards and Environmental Guidelines. Specifically, the company will need to:

- Upgrade SEMS practices to the satisfaction of IFC;
- Commit to implement the revised SEMS to ensure the investments are in compliance with applicable requirements;
- Commit to take action to remedy any gaps in the SEMS on an on going basis;
- Once the SEMS has been revised, submit to the IFC examples of the first 3 projects processed with the upgraded SEMS; and
- Submit an Annual Environmental Performance Report (AEPR) to IFC as per format provided by IFC.

Through the implementation of the SEMS, LAAD will manage environmental and social risks. As appropriate IFC may require additional information on specific projects. Following the implementation of revised SEMS, some selected site supervision visits may be carried out jointly by IFC and LAAD staff.