ADB to provide Pakistan $10bn in next five years

ISLAMABAD: Asian Development Bank (ADB) plans to provide Pakistan with about $10 billion in fresh assistance for sectors including urban services, disaster risk reduction and policy-based programmes in the next five years.

This was been disclosed by ADB Central & West Asia Department Director General (DG) Eugenue Zukhov in a meeting with Federal Minister for Economic Affairs Omar Ayub Khan here on Tuesday.

The minister for Economic Affairs appreciated ADB for continued technical and financial support to the government of Pakistan and also acknowledged the regional development bank for providing $500 million for the procurement of Covid vaccines, adding that the government is committed to providing maximum vaccination coverage to the eligible population. 

The minister highlighted that given rapid urbanisation and population growth, the urban services sector was a high priority. “The government is committed to improving urban infrastructure and services including water and sanitation services, public transport, urban flooding, disaster management, and health facilities,” he added. 

At present, ADB is financing 32 development projects amounting to $6.4 billion in energy, road and transport, agriculture and irrigation, urban services, education, health and social protection. 

Omar highlighted that through the National Coordination Committee (NCC) on foreign funded projects, EAD had not only significantly improved performance of ongoing projects by removing major bottlenecks including delays in land acquisition and hiring project staff, but had also undertaken an internal exercise to weed out non-performing projects to redirect resources towards the sustainable ones. 

He informed Zhukov that further efforts are being made within the ministry to improve project management and oversight by creating a dedicated monitoring cell.  

While assuring that the government is committed to completing structural reforms in multiple areas of the economy including energy, capital markets, trade competitiveness, domestic resource mobilisation and governance, the minister suggested new areas for ADB’s assistance including support for the provision of basic amenities i.e. energy, roads and urban services etc. to erstwhile FATA region which has been merged into the province of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP). 

Eugenue Zukhov detailed ADB’s plan to provide Pakistan with the fresh assistance and also informed the government that an additional financing of $700 million is currently available for Pakistan to procure Covid-19 vaccines under ADB’s APVAX facility. 

He commended the minister for Economic Affairs for his proactive approach for enhanced partnership and regular portfolio reviews.  

The two sides agreed to continue discussing ways to further deepen their development partnership and ensure the effectiveness of the ongoing portfolio.