Support for SMEs and mid-caps, urban development and advisory services
Operations benefited 4 000 businesses and supported some 81 000 jobs
Ten-year record for EIF, unlocking €1.8 billion for SMEs in Bulgaria
The European Investment Bank Group (EIB Group), which consists of the European Investment Bank (EIB) and the European Investment Fund (EIF), provided loans, guarantees and equity commitments worth €443 million for projects in Bulgaria in 2020. This represents a 23% increase in total financing activities compared to 2019.
In 2020, EIB lending in Bulgaria amounted to €115 million. The EIF committed some €328 million in new operations for small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), which is expected to unlock €1.8 billion for SMEs in Bulgaria, most of which will support those that are struggling under the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic.
EIB Vice-President Lilyana Pavlova said: “2020 has been a very challenging year for all of us. The COVID-19 pandemic has triggered an unprecedented global crisis. In this context, I am proud that the EIB Group has increased its financing, in particular for SMEs. Our financial support is helping to improve people’s lives and has an important role in boosting the economic development of Bulgaria during the pandemic. I want to thank all our partners and assure you that we stand ready to support SMEs, regional cohesion, climate action and urban development to create employment and prosperity across Bulgaria.”
Deputy-Minister of Finance of BulgariaMarinela Petrova said: “We highly appreciate the active role of the Bank in the fulfilment of the climate-related strategic objectives and priorities of the European Commission and the Member States, as well as its willingness to support Member States in the implementation of the transition towards climate neutrality. In order to successfully use the financial opportunities provided by the European Commission and the EIB, it is essential to identify the specific investment needs and to prepare quality projects. With its experience and expertise in financing investments in the area of infrastructure, innovation, climate and environment, the Bank can significantly support this process and contribute to the successful transition of Bulgaria to carbon neutrality.”
In a virtual press conference, Marinela Petrova, Bulgarian Deputy Minister of Finance and member of the EIB Board of Directors, and EIB Vice-President Lilyana Pavlova presented the impact of the EIB Group’s financing in Bulgaria and discussed the strategic outlook for the EU bank in the year ahead. In addition, Vice-President Pavlova gave an overview of the main EIB Group activities in 2020, including the response to the COVID-19 pandemic and the key role it plays in fighting the climate crisis.
The press conference was followed by a virtual conference, organised by the EIB Economics Department, to present the annual EIB Investment Survey results for Bulgaria. The survey gathers unique insights on the corporate investment landscape in the European Union.
The survey found that in Bulgaria, COVID-19 has substantially affected firms’ investment strategies. It prompted nearly half of firms to invest less than planned (46%) and only very few to invest more than planned (7%). Bulgarian firms’ reaction to the pandemic is in line with the EU average (45%). A quarter of firms cited the increased use of digital technologies (25%) compared to half of firms in the European Union (50%). A quarter of firms expect a permanent reduction in employment (25%) as a long-term impact of COVID-19, similar to the EU average (21%). In addition, almost two-thirds (63%) of firms in Bulgaria have no investment plans to tackle climate change impact, well above the EU average (35%).
Sir Elton John has called for a “short-term fix” to make it easier for British musicians to tour in Europe.
Sir Elton John
The ‘Tiny Dancer’ hitmaker has spoken out after musicians were left out of the Brexit trade deal, meaning they may have to acquire visa for every European country they wish to perform in, a policy which critics fear mean may lead to such a large rise in costs, artists will be unable to afford to play in the EU.
Branding the current situation “ridiculous”, Elton wrote for The Guardian newspaper: “Either the Brexit negotiators didn’t care about musicians, or didn’t think about them, or weren’t sufficiently prepared.
“They screwed up. It’s ultimately down to the British government to sort it out: they need to go back and renegotiate.”
With Elton acknowledging that “renegotiating freedom of movement is complicated and is going to take a lot of time”, he called for a “support organisation” to help young artists navigate the new difficulties, particularly now when the coronavirus pandemic has provided a “window of opportunity” to get something in place while live music is still on hold.
He said: ” If you’ve just made your first album, and you’ve got that fresh momentum building behind you, it’s no use waiting for two or three years before you tour – you have to catch that energy while it’s on fire, you have to go out and play, and you have to take yourself to as many different audiences as possible.
“What musicians need now is a short-term fix. We should set up a support organisation, funded partly by the music industry itself, where artists who don’t have the kind of infrastructure that I benefit from can access lawyers and accountants to help them navigate the touring problems created by Brexit.
“The pandemic has put a stop to live music in the immediate future, so we should use the window of opportunity we have now to set this support organisation up.”
And the 73-year-old music legend felt it’s his own biggest critics who should support his campaign more than anyone else.
He wrote: “if you hate every note I’ve recorded, because your tastes are edgier, weirder and more exploratory – if you think that the Parisian hotdog thrower had a good point – you need to support musicians’ ability to tour.
“Because if Brexit prevents many new musicians from touring, the only artists who are going to have any meaningful kind of live career are big, august, mainstream artists like me. And, trust me, I don’t want that any more than you do.”
The issue is due to be debated in parliament on Monday (08.02.21) after over 280,000 musicians and music fans signed a petition calling for new negotiations with the EU.
RIO DE JANEIRO (AP) – Laura D’Oya, a priestess of an Afro-Brazilian religion, was at the center of the ceremony. Crouched down, she held a cigar in one of her hands and a top hat in the other. The temple in Rio de Janeiro was illuminated by red lights and dozens of practitioners sang and danced to the rhythm of an atabaque, a traditional hand drum.
The volume of goods going through British ports to the European Union has fallen by as much as 68% since Brexit, according to the Road Haulage Association, as the UK grapples with its new trading relationship with the bloc.
The number of customs brokers need to be increased fivefold to help firms with extra checks, Richard Burnett, chief executive officer of the RHA, wrote in a letter to Cabinet Minister Michael Gove dated Feb. 1. The trade group estimates there are only 10,000 agents in place so far, about a fifth of what’s needed.
“The current situation should not be considered a consequence of Covid,” Burnett wrote in the letter. “If anything, the absence of the pandemic would have made it worse, because volumes would be greater.”
Freight firms have been shunning the U.K since it left the bloc’s single market on Dec. 31, with additional checks creating hours-long queues and extra costs for exporters.
In addition to the decline in goods crossing the border, between 65% and 75% of vehicles that arrived from the EU were returning empty because there were no goods for them to transport, the Observer reported, citing RHA’s Burnett.
This story has been published from a wire agency feed without modifications to the text. Only the headline has been changed.
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Among the items Caritas Kasama donated were bags of maize, cooking oil, packets of sugar, salt and assorted clothing. Speaking at the handover ceremony in Chifulo village, Director of Caritas Kasama, Father Leonard Kalyoti, explained that last year (2020), the Archbishop of Kasama, Ignatius Chama, appealed to the Christian faithful in the Archdiocese to donate, whatever the could, towards those affected by the floods.
Grateful to parish priests and parishioners
Father Kalyoti has since expressed gratitude to parish priests and the Catholic faithful of the Archdiocese of Kasama for their generosity towards the noble diocesan cause.
At the handover ceremony, Parish Priest of Mediatrix of All Graces, Malole Parish, Father Edward Mutale, thanked Archbishop Chama and Caritas Kasama for coming to the aid of the people. Father Mutale reminded beneficiaries that the foods donated were meant to cushion them as they await the next harvest season.
A Diocesan Bag of Solidarity Campaign
Meanwhile, Caritas Kasama has launched a diocesan campaign known as the Bag of Solidarity Campaign. The idea is to collect donations that would then be channelled towards the Archdiocese of Kasama’s vulnerable communities.
The EU and UK have behaved like an “absentee landlord” in relation to Northern Ireland, an expert on Brexit in the region has said, as a new report by the Institute for Government has warned of more conflict across all issues “if the UK fails to manage the relationship” with Brussels.
Under the Brexit trade deal more than 20 committees and bodies are supposed to be set up to cement a working post-Brexit relationship on everything from fishing to energy supplies and aviation deals.
A further dozen or so were due to be created following the signing of the Northern Ireland protocol a year ago, and it is the failure to set up these management structures that is being seen as the cause of rising tensions in the region that led to the withdrawal of Brexit staff at ports last week.
“The protocol is not an easy thing to start up with a click of the fingers. But there has been this sense of an absentee landlord with all these rules coming into play and with no means of direct engagement to help manage the consequences of it,” said Katy Hayward, a professor of sociology at Queen’s University in Belfast and a former adviser to the government’s now defunct Brexit department.
“The main concern of the European commission has been to demonstrate and prove to other member states that the single market is being protected,” she said, adding that such a one-dimensional approach had been a misfit for Northern Ireland, a region still going through a post-conflict peace process that the EU itself had put to the fore of negotiations.
The report by the Institute for Government on managing the UK’s relationship with the EU makes a similar point on the wider Brexit relationship and says the structures for management need to be put in place urgently.
Bronwen Maddox, the thinktank’s director, described it in a podcast on Saturday as like “the hidden wiring was missing”.
The institute says the committees will serve as platforms for expert and on-the-ground reporting which will act, in Northern Ireland’s case, as an early warning system to head off problems before they arise.
Its report says “the government appears inclined at every turn to downplay the significance of the UK’s relationship with the EU – and to have a preference for dealing bilaterally with individual member states rather than with the EU institutions.
“It may also fear that creating an overelaborate bureaucracy to manage the EU relationship would produce a mindset where the EU looms larger in internal thinking than it needs to.
“The government wanted a Canada-style agreement with the EU but … Brussels will never regard the UK as simply Toronto on Thames – and if the UK fails to manage the relationship well it may find it ends up with more conflicts with the EU than if it had spent more time thinking in advance about the issue.”
Under the Northern Ireland protocol a working consultative group was supposed to have been set up to feed into the UK-EU joint committee overseeing the implementation of Brexit.
But although the protocol was signed off more than a year ago it was never set up, leading to the rigorous application of it that has led to restrictions on food, pets and plants, all of which has been seized upon by loyalist communities and others as evidence of separation from Great Britain.
But Hayward says there are solutions for Michael Gove and the European commission vice-president, Maroš Šefčovič, who will meet next week, with part of the protocol explicitly allowing for an easing of controls at ports.
Article 6.2 of the protocol states the committee shall regard Northern Ireland’s “integral place in the United Kingdom’s internal market” and make “best endeavours to facilitate trade between Northern Ireland and the other parts of the UK”.
It adds that the ease of trade between Northern Ireland and the UK shall be kept under constant review and the committee can at any time make “appropriate recommendations with a view to avoiding controls at the ports and the airports of Northern Ireland to the extent possible”.
Hayward said: “The hope would be that those EU observers could recognise the nature of the situation and would be able to see where there could be flexibility and pragmatism.”
• The headline and text of this article were amended on 7 February 2021 to better reflect Prof Hayward’s comments.
The UK wants the European Union to know that it isn’t one to be “pushed around” over the Northern Ireland issue, according to Attorney General for England and Wales Suella Braverman.
The AG, who also holds the position of advocate general for Northern Ireland, told The Sunday Telegraph that the UK “will do whatever it takes to ensure we get a good settlement for the Union”.
“Boris stood up to the EU last year and we got a good deal. I am really confident we are not going to let the EU push Northern Ireland around”, Braverman added firmly.
Suella Braverman the Attorney General for England and Wales, walks from Downing Street to attend a cabinet meeting at the Foreign and Commonwealth Office in London, Tuesday, Sept. 22, 2020
The official also cited remarks made by Prime Minister Boris Johnson, who during a Q&A session in the Parliament this week said that the UK “will do everything” it needs to do “to ensure that there is no barrier down the Irish Sea” – even if it means triggering Article 16 of the Northern Ireland Protocol.
The clause is specifically designed to allow the EU or the UK to override the agreement in relation to the Irish issue if the protocol starts causing “economic, societal or environmental difficulties”.
Johnson’s comments came as a response to Brussels’ call at the end of January to introduce export controls – and effectively checks – along the border between the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland amid attempts to prevent COVID vaccines from being shipped to the UK from the EU over disagreements regarding AstraZeneca supplies. The decision was not made in consultation with either London, Dublin, or Belfast, and unsurprisingly caused outrage among British and Irish officials, who pointed out that Brussels had been the one that repeatedly told the UK about the impossibility of having a hard border between the countries due to their troubled history. The proposal was quickly reversed.
A woman walks her dog past past graffiti with the words ‘No Irish Sea Border’ in Belfast city centre, Northern Ireland, Wednesday, Feb. 3, 2021
But the UK is still not happy about some parts of the agreement, namely new paperwork and checks on goods entering Northern Ireland from Great Britain under the protocol – an issue that left Belfast with empty supermarket shelves in January, shortly after the Brexit deal came into force.
Johnson said that if no resolution is found to the issue, Britain could respond in the same manner the EU did when making its call to trigger Article 16.
The leader of Northern Ireland’s Democratic Unionist Party Arlene Foster said this week that the Irish clause “has not worked, cannot work”, and called on the prime minister to replace it.
According to a report by the Daily Mail, “physical inspections” of goods from Great Britain to Northern Ireland “have been suspended at ports amid intimidation of staff” as the row over the Northern Ireland Protocol continues.
Amanda S. C. Gorman (born 1998) is an American poet and activist. Her work focuses on issues of oppression, feminism, race, and marginalization, as well as the African diaspora. Gorman was the first person to be named National Youth Poet Laureate. She published the poetry book The One for Whom Food Is Not Enough in 2015. In 2021, she delivered her poem “The Hill We Climb” at the inauguration of U.S. President Joe Biden. Her inauguration poem generated international acclaim, stimulated her two books to reach best-seller status, and earned her a professional management contract.
Early life and education
Gorman was born in Los Angeles, California, in 1998. She was raised by her single mother, Joan Wicks, a 6th-grade English teacher in Watts, with her two siblings. She has a twin sister, Gabrielle, who is an activist and filmmaker. Gorman has said she grew up in an environment with limited television access. She has described her young self as a “weird child” who enjoyed reading and writing and was encouraged by her mother.
Gorman has an auditory processing disorder and is hypersensitive to sound. She also had a speech impediment during childhood. Gorman participated in speech therapy during her childhood and Elida Kocharian of The Harvard Crimson wrote in 2018, “Gorman doesn’t view her speech impediment as a crutch—rather, she sees it as a gift and a strength.” Gorman told The Harvard Gazette in 2018, “I always saw it as a strength because since I was experiencing these obstacles in terms of my auditory and vocal skills, I became really good at reading and writing. I realized that at a young age when I was reciting the Marianne Deborah Williamson quote that ’Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate, our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure’ to my mom.” In 2021, Gorman told CBS This Morning co-host Anthony Mason that she used songs as a form of speech therapy, and explained “My favorite thing to practice was the song Aaron Burr, Sir, from “Hamilton” because it is jam-packed with R’s. And I said, ’if I can keep up with Leslie in this track, then I am on my way to being able to say this R in a poem.”
Gorman attended New Roads, a private school in Santa Monica, for grades K–12. As a senior, she received a Milken Family Foundation college scholarship. She studied sociology at Harvard College, graduating cum laude in 2020, as a member of Phi Beta Kappa.
Career
2014-15
Gorman’s art and activism focus on issues of oppression, feminism, race, and marginalization, as well as the African diaspora. She has said she was inspired to become a youth delegate for the United Nations in 2013 after watching a speech by Pakistani Nobel Prize laureate Malala Yousafzai. Gorman was chosen as the youth poet laureate of Los Angeles in 2014. In 2014 it was reported that Gorman was “editing the first draft of a novel the 16‑year‑old has been writing over the last two years.” She published the poetry book The One for Whom Food Is Not Enough in 2015.
In 2016, Gorman founded the nonprofit organization One Pen One Page, a youth writing and leadership program. In 2017, she became the first author to be featured on XQ Institute’s Book of the Month, a monthly giveaway to share inspiring Gen Z’s favorite books. She wrote a tribute for black athletes for Nike and has a book deal with Viking Children’s Books to write two children’s picture books.
In 2017, Gorman became the first youth poet to open the literary season for the Library of Congress, and she has read her poetry on MTV. She wrote “In This Place: An American Lyric” for her September 2017 performance at the Library of Congress, which commemorated the inauguration of Tracy K. Smith as Poet Laureate of the United States. The Morgan Library and Museum acquired her poem “In This Place (An American Lyric)” and displayed it in 2018 near works by Elizabeth Bishop.
While at Harvard, Gorman became the first person to be named National Youth Poet Laureate in April 2017. She was chosen from five finalists. In 2017, Gorman won a $10,000 grant from media company OZY in the annual OZY Genius Awards through which 10 college students are given “the opportunity to pursue their outstanding ideas and envisioned innovations”.
In 2017, Gorman said she intends to run for president in 2036 and she has subsequently often repeated this hope. On being selected as one of Glamour magazine’s 2018 “College Women of the Year”, she said: “Seeing the ways that I as a young black woman can inspire people is something I want to continue in politics. I don’t want to just speak works; I want to turn them into realities and actions.” After she read her poem “The Hill We Climb” at President Joe Biden’s inauguration in 2021, Hillary Clinton tweeted her support for Gorman’s 2036 aspiration.
In 2019, Gorman was chosen as one of The Root magazine’s “Young Futurists”, an annual list of “the 25 best and brightest young African-Americans who excel in the fields of social justice and activism, arts and culture, enterprise and corporate innovation, science and technology, and green innovation”.
In May 2020, Gorman appeared in an episode of the web series Some Good News hosted by John Krasinski, where she had the opportunity to virtually meet Oprah Winfrey and issued a virtual commencement speech to those who could not attend commencements due to the COVID-19 pandemic in the U.S.
In 2020, Gorman presented “Earthrise”, a poem focused on the climate crisis.
Gorman read her poem “The Hill We Climb” at the inauguration of Joe Biden on January 20, 2021, and is the youngest poet to read at a presidential inauguration in United States history.[ Jill Biden recommended her for the inauguration. After January 6, 2021, Gorman amended her poem’s wording to address the storming of the United States Capitol. During the week before the inauguration, she told Washington Post book critic Ron Charles, “My hope is that my poem will represent a moment of unity for our country” and “with my words, I’ll be able to speak to a new chapter and era for our nation.”
Before her performance, Gorman told “CBS This Morning” co-host Anthony Mason, “One of the preparations that I do always whenever I perform is I say a mantra to myself, which is ’I’m the daughter of black writers. We’re descended from freedom fighters who broke through chains and changed the world. They call me.’ And that is the way in which I prepare myself for the duty that needs to get done.”
Soon after Gorman’s performance at the inauguration, her two upcoming books, the poetry collection The Hill We Climb and a project for youth, Change Sings: A Children’s Anthem, were at the top of Amazon’s bestseller list. Both are scheduled to be released in September 2021. A book version of the poem “The Hill We Climb” is scheduled to be released on March 16, 2021, with a foreword by Oprah Winfrey, and each of Gorman’s three upcoming books will have first printings of one million copies.
IMG Models and its parent company WME signed Gorman for representation in fashion, beauty, and talent endorsements. She is represented in the publishing industry by Writers House and by the Gang, Tyre, Ramer, Brown and Passman law firm.
Gorman was commissioned to compose an original poem to be recited at Super Bowl LV’s pregame ceremony, to be held on February 7, 2021, as an introduction to the three honorary captains who would preside over the coin-toss.
Personal life
Gorman is a black Catholic, a member of St. Brigid Catholic Church in her hometown of Los Angeles. On the day after the Biden inaugural, she appeared on The Late Late Show with James Corden, where she said that Corden was “[her] favorite human being ever created.”Michael Cirelli, executive director of Urban Word NYC, described her as a “powerhouse” and has joked that “[Gorman’s] bio goes out of date every two weeks.”In 2014 it was reported that she “aspires to be a human rights advocate.”
Honors and recognition
2014: Chosen as youth poet laureate of Los Angeles
2017: Chosen as National Youth Poet Laureate
2017: OZY Genius Award
2018: Named one of Glamour magazine’s College Women of the Year
2019: Named on The Root’s “Young Futurists” list
2021: Selected to read at the inauguration of Joe Biden, becoming the youngest poet ever to read at a US presidential inauguration
Bibliography
Books
The One for Whom Food Is Not Enough. Urban Word LA. 2015. ISBN 978-0-9900122-9-0.
Taylor, Keren, ed. (2013). “Candy Cane”; “Poetry Is”. You are here : the WriteGirl journey. Los Angeles: WriteGirl Publications. pp. 210, 281. ISBN 978-0-98370812-4. OCLC 868918187.
The Hill We Climb: Poems. Viking Books for Young Readers. 2021. ISBN 978-0-593-46506-6. OCLC 1232185776.
The Hill We Climb: An Inaugural Poem for the Country. Viking Books for Young Readers. 2021. ISBN 978-0-593-46527-1. OCLC 1232234825.
Change Sings: A Children’s Anthem. Viking Books for Young Readers. 2021. ISBN 978-0-593-20322-4. OCLC 1232149089.
Plymouth fishing boat trawlerman and captain of the stern trawler ‘Nicola Anne’ Kyle Bishop Meades controls the winch as the net is released for the first trawl of the day, at sea off the south-west coast of England. – AFP
LONDON: Brexit and coronavirus have slashed the volume of surface freight leaving Britain for the European Union by 68 percent from last January, according to figures published in The Observer yesterday. The stark drop in goods carried on ferries and through the Channel tunnel was registered by lobby group the Road Haulage Association (RHA) after a survey of its international members, said the weekly.
RHA chief executive Richard Burnett has sent a letter to minister Michael Gove warning that the new checks required since Britain fully left the EU’s single market on January 1 were deterring exporters from shipping to the continent. He said the government had only hired around 20 percent of the extra border staff needed to process the extra paperwork.
“Michael Gove is the master of extracting information from you and giving nothing back,” Burnett told the newspaper. “Pretty much every time we have written over the last six months he has not responded in writing.” Britain sent around £294 billion ($403 billion, 335 billion euros) of goods to the EU in 2019, accounting for around 43 percent of its total exports, according to official figures.
The situation threatens to get worse in July, when Britain implements its full range of physical border checks. Trade experts told the paper that the sharp fall in exports was the “coincidence of Brexit and the pandemic”. Britain and Europe have imposed tight travel restrictions during the latest wave of the pandemic, with France temporarily imposing a total ban on vehicles entering from Britain shortly before Christmas.
Truckers heading over the Channel to France now require a negative COVID test before making the crossing. A government spokesperson told The Observer that “we do not recognize the figure provided on exports”. “Thanks to the hard work of hauliers and traders to prepare for change, disruption at the border has so far been minimal and freight movements are now close to normal levels, despite the COVID-19 pandemic,” they added. – AFP
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