From SLEIDSE to Raqam-E, Expertise France is continuing to support entrepreneurship in Libya

“Libya has strong development potential, whatever the context: the country has a community of young entrepreneurs who are both strong and dynamic”, says Jérémie Pellet, Chief Executive Officer of Expertise France. SLEIDSE has therefore targeted small businesses and entrepreneurs and, more specifically, women and young people. The aim is to contribute to providing the necessary tools and support to set up and develop companies. The project has also worked on improving the image of entrepreneurs among the general public in Libya.

Five major successes for the SLEIDSE programme

SLEIDSE has helped Libyan economic actors develop economic infrastructure:

• SLEIDSE has contributed to the creation of the largest community of entrepreneurs in the country. It currently has over 120,000 active members on Facebook. It allows entrepreneurs to exchange views, recommendations and to network. This community was created and is led by Nessrin Gaddah, who is both an influencer on social networks and the community manager of the project.

• SLEIDSE has also organised a number of events to activate this community: bootcamps and business plan competitions, with 50% of participants being women, have been organised in Tunis, Benghazi, Misrata and Tripoli to train, mobilise and facilitate networks of young entrepreneurs.

• From a more institutional perspective, the SLEIDSE team has worked on reactivating the National Guarantee Fund. This fund is a guarantee mechanism for business loans. As such, it facilitates access to credit for companies and injects liquidity into the real economy.

• SLEIDSE has also improved the capacities of business support organisations, such as chambers of commerce and incubators, to offer services tailored to the needs of entrepreneurs. The team has trained the chambers of commerce and set up incubators in universities to improve their ability to provide effective support to companies.

• SLEIDSE has also contributed to improving training for entrepreneurs in Libya: the project has not only created Libus, an online business school, with ICT, but has also set up a code school in Janzour. Both are freely accessible to Libyan entrepreneurs.

“Our main success has been to demonstrate that it is possible to work in Libya, despite all the negative comments about the country. Thanks to the extraordinary commitment of our teams, which are made up of Libyans, Tunisians and international members, we have managed to initiate a fruitful cooperation with a number of economic actors in the country”, said Alexandre Chatillon-Mounier, who is managing Expertise France’s economic development programme in Libya.

SLEIDSE, a first stage

For Jérémie Pellet, “The SLEIDSE programme was a first stage in our support to these men and women in their efforts to build a better future. We have provided our technical expertise, networking opportunities, mentoring, as well as financial support. Raqam-E will pursue this objective of supporting economic diversification. We are looking forward to working with these young Libyan men and women entrepreneurs”, he adds.     

The success of SLEIDSE has allowed Expertise France to implement other projects on related themes. They are now part of an Expertise France programme for economic development in Libya:

• Raqam-E aims to create 4 code schools in 4 different cities, as well as a training centre, and organise 2 national hackathons (EUR 1.5m, financed by the French State);

• EU4PSL supports the development of the economic sector and civil society and facilitates access to financing for SMEs (EUR 10m, financed by the European Union);

• STREAM aims to create an incubator, an accelerator and a fab lab in Tripoli (EUR 2m, financed by the UK Government);

• MFI is the first microfinance institution set up to support a local bank, opened in late 2019 (EUR 2m, financed by the UK Government);

• Creation of a Code School in Janzour (opened in January 2020);

• Support for social entrepreneurship (EUR 0.5m of financing via UNICEF).

Find out more about the activities of Expertise France in Libya