On March 13, the Western NIS Enterprise Fund will open its third office in Ukraine (after Kyiv and Lviv). This office will be engaged in making loans to small businesses ranging from $10,000 to $100,000 for two years to companies operating within 200 kilometers of Kharkiv. In over two years of activity in Ukraine the Fund has made loans to 52 small companies operating within 200 km of Kyiv and Lviv totaling $2,331,000. Its credit portfolio includes bakeries, mills, macaroni makers, wood-processing, meat-processing companies, dairy plants, dry cleaners, farms motor repair shops, etc. The Western NIS Enterprise Fund intends to invest in small business loans $5 million of the $150 million earmarked by the US government to support small and medium-sized private businesses in Ukraine, Russia, and Belarus.






