...

German government approves additional financing for water supply in Azerbaijan

Business Materials 18 February 2010 18:42 (UTC +04:00)

Azerbaijan, Baku, Feb. 18 / Trend I. Khalilova /

The German government approved giving additional funds to Azerbaijan worth 63 million euros for the continuation of activities to fuly restore water supply and sewerage system in Ganja and Sheki, KfW Baku office head Natiq Abdullayev said.

Currently, the first phase of this project is being realized. KfW allocated 37 million euros on it. The bank plans to allocate 23 million euros with total cost of 30 million euros to realize the second phase and fully restore water supply system of Ganja. At the third stage, the bank expects to allocate 40 million euros for the installation of modern sewage treatment plants, Abdullayev said.

"The Azerbaijani government made a request to allocate funds to bring the sewerage system to European standards," Abdullayev said.

The decision to provide additional funding from the bank will be made after the promotions in the first phase of the project.

Meanwhile, the Azerbaijani government and "Azersu" JSC requested the Swiss State Secretariat for Economic Affairs (Seco) to finance for the continuation of this project.

Continuation of the project will fully allow connecting two cities to a new system to improve water supply and sewerage services. It was excluded from the first phase to use the remaining funds for the development of water systems of Ganja and Sheki at the request of the government. Moreover, these activities will be conducted without interruption between the completion of the first and the beginning of the second phases of the project.

The first phase of the project envisages improving the quality and reliability of water supply and sewerage system in the cities of Ganja and Sheki with a budget of 55 million euros. KfW will give loans worth 37 million euros, and Seco - 10 million euros in the form of a grant to realize the project in accordance with the agreements signed in Bern in October 2006. The share of the Azerbaijani government in the project is eight million euros.

Consulting services and a partial restoration of infrastructure in Sheki, in particular the purchase of equipment are planned to be implemented owing to Seco's funds.

Seco's financing of the second phase of the project depends on real results of realization of the first phase of the project, the representative of the State Secretariat in Azerbaijan Naila Safarova said.

A consultant of the bank on the first phase of the project is a Swiss consulting company Colenco. Besides preparing the technical conditions of the tender, its task includes the institutional improvement of Ganja and Sheki water systems. Activities to improve the structure of water systems and construction work will be conducted in parallel.

Latest

Latest