The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) is a multilateral development bank whose founding agreement was signed in Paris in May 1990 and entered into force in March 1991, with the Bank beginning operations that April to support the transition to well-functioning market economies, originally in central and eastern Europe and now across three continents. It is owned by 77 national governments from five continents together with the European Union and the European Investment Bank, with each shareholder represented on its Board of Governors. EBRD's stated mandate is to enable a well-run and sustainable private sector by combining financial investment, technical guidance and support for policy and institutional reform, while promoting environmentally and socially sustainable development; uniquely among development banks, it also carries a political mandate, assisting only countries committed to multi-party democracy and pluralism. It provides project finance, equity investments (including significant private equity fund investments), and guarantees, notably through its Trade Facilitation Programme, which issues guarantees to confirming banks to cover payment risk on trade transactions and extends loans to partner banks to finance their customers' trade. EBRD has invested more than 220 billion euro across over 7,800 projects to date. It works across ten sector categories: energy, equity funds, financial institutions, food and agribusiness, manufacturing and services, municipal infrastructure, natural resources, real estate, telecoms/media/technology, and transport, and invests in economies across Central and South Eastern Europe, the Caucasus, Central Asia, the Southern and Eastern Mediterranean, and, more recently, Sub-Saharan Africa.