ADB ready to increase annual lending level to Nepal

Kathmandu January 22- The country would be able to obtain more resources in the coming years from the Asian Development Bank (ADB), as the multilateral development agency has said that it is ready to increase annual lending level to Nepal by 60 per cent starting from the present level of about $275 million per annum.

However, the country’s current project implementation performance has raised eyebrows, as the government has been utilising only half of the amount of effective loans and grants since the last four years.

ADB has stressed on improvement of the project implementation performance to avail more funding for the country’s development.

“Following the recent reforms of ADB’s financial resource, the bank is ready to increase the annual lending level to Nepal by 60 per cent starting 2017 from the present level. However, this will critically depend on accelerating the implementation of existing projects,” said Hun Kim, director general of ADB’s South Asia Regional Department.

Nepal’s overall performance of its portfolio has been trailing behind the ADB average. Of the net available funding amount of $1.733 billion spread over 33 investment projects, 55 per cent is still to be contracted and 72 per cent is still to be disbursed.

Addressing the opening session of the annual Country Portfolio Review Mission (CPRM) of ADB projects in Kathmandu, the ADB director general urged the government and ADB staff to improve the project implementation performance of the ADB-funded projects to tap the opportunities of increased lending space provided by ADB. Source: THT