The Asian Development Bank's loan and grant disbursements to Pakistan amounted to $2.4 billion in 2019, comprising $1.8 billion in programme lending and $634.3 million in project lending. The Bank in its review released on Friday stated that it has provided $1.8 billion in policy-based loans, including $1 billion in immediate budget support to shore up the country's public finances and $500 million to improve trade competitiveness.
The ADB also provided additional financing of $200 million to help support the Benazir Income Support Program (BISP) - part of the government's flagship Ehsas Poverty Alleviation Strategy aimed at reducing inequality and investing in economically disadvantaged people.
Further the Bank approved a $235 million loan to Sindh in 2019 to help develop a bus rapid transit (BRT) system with innovative energy and climate resilience features in Karachi. ADB also approved $75 million project loan to enhance secondary education in Sindh. To help strengthen project readiness prior to approval, ADB approved project readiness financing totaling $17.3 million in 2019 for the cities improvement project in Khyber Pakhtunkwa and the water resources project in Punjab.
In agriculture, ADB approved a major change in scope of Trimmu and Panjnad barrages adding Islam barrage by utilizing surplus loan proceeds of $21 million, and initiated work on $275 million Jalalpur irrigation project.
ADB approved a grant of $5.1 million for enhancing Punjab technology based agriculture and marketing, market development and preparing Kurram Tangi integrated water resources development project. In the energy sector, ADB maintained its strong presence with an ongoing portfolio of $2.2 billion covering energy generation, transmission, distribution, energy efficiency, renewable energy development, and analytical tools and advisory assistance.
In 2019, ADB committed a $300 million policy-based loan that will help Pakistan towards financial sustainability, governance, and address energy infrastructure policy constraints.
ADB's ongoing portfolio in the transport sector totals $2.5 billion and spans urban corridors, border crossing points, green motorways and expressways, and existing national and provincial highways. In 2019, ADB committed a $75 million loan to widen and upgrade 42 kilometers of the busy Mardan-Swabi road in the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province.
ADB successfully completed the flood emergency reconstruction and resilience project, under which 1,740 km of provincial highways and district roads were rehabilitated. Another 204 km of major roads were rehabilitated, and 75 km of district roads were repaired in the three districts. About 800 hectares of landslide area was stabilized in the three northern districts using bio-engineering measures. The project also rehabilitated 90 percent of flood protection infrastructure.
Two new flood protection embankments were built along both banks of the river Jhelum with a cumulative length of about 7,300 meters. The project also developed the safety inspection manuals for flood protection infrastructure.
ADB is also actively supporting Public Private Partnership initiatives of the provinces and the federal government to support the delivery of public infrastructure with private sector participation, along with development of fiscal risk management functions.
ADB is implementing two loans of $100 million each for the provinces of Sindh and Punjab, with a co-financing grant from DFID, government of the UK. The projects are supporting public-private partnerships in the provinces by augmenting the resources for project development facility and viability gap funding to structure and develop more viable PPP projects that offer value-for-money.
In 2019, ADB helped complete the 125-kilometer Motorway M4 (Gojra-Khanewal section). The ADB-administered M4 project financed with AIIB, alongside grant from DFID, was AIIB's first ever project.
The Pakistan National Transport Policy and Maser Plan supported by ADB and DFID was officially launched following its approval by the federal cabinet in 2018, and road safety and road asset management secretariats promoted under the National Transport Policy were established. ADB secured financing of $49 million ($37 million loan and $12 million grant) from the Green Climate Fund - supplementing a proposed loan of $435 million; $235 million was from ADB and $100 million each from the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB) and Agency Française de Développement - to build a 26.6-km state-of-the-art BRT system in Karachi.
Commitments in non-sovereign operations funded by ordinary capital resources for the period 2007 to 2019 totaled $767 million, with $15 million committed in 2019. A $15 million loan to Kashf Foundation was signed in August for expanding access to credit for women project.
The funding will support Kashf Foundation's lending to low-income women, female micro- and small entrepreneurs and low cost schools in Pakistan. ADB's Trade Finance Program (TFP) fill market gaps by providing guarantees and loans through partner banks in support of trade. In Pakistan, the TFP works with 13 banks and has supported $16.03 billion in trade and 5,159 transactions as of November 2019 - 52.9% of the $16.03 billion was co-financed by the private sector.
The supply chain finance programme has supported $0.88 million in trade over 5 transactions as of November in Pakistan and mobilized $0.44 million in co-financing.
Comments
Comments are closed.