KIEV, UKRAINE — The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) is investing $25 million in a Serbian-based soybean concentrates producer, Sojaprotein.

The EBRD loan will be utilized to expand the company’s production facilities as well as for debt refinancing.

Sojaprotein operates the largest soybean-processing factory in Serbia, with a capacity of 250,000 tonnes per year. The company uses only non-GMO soybeans for processing, with full traceability and origination from bean growers to the production of finished products.

The company is a subsidiary of the Serbian agribusiness company Victoria Group, recently acquired by MK Group, a longstanding EBRD partner. MK Group, which was founded over 35 years ago, employs over 7,000 people and is a major agribusiness group in south-eastern Europe. The EBRD’s financing will support MK Group to further develop its production capacity and export prospects.

Raiffeisen banka a.d. Beograd is providing an equally sized parallel loan as part of the project.