Azerbaijan, Baku, Sept. 18 / Trend A. Akhundov /
The Asian Development Bank (ADB) has completed a thematic evaluation of the state, economic, social and private sectors to enable it to start working on a new Country Partnership Strategy with Azerbaijan, head of ADB representative office in Baku Olly Noroyono told Trend on Monday.
"We are completing the sectorial and thematic evaluations," he said. "It was initially planned to finalise the strategy preparation by the middle of next year. However, we cannot fix any precise date as the dialogue is underway with the government."
He said that the strategy can be prepared in accordance with the action plan within the state programme on Poverty Reduction and Sustainable Development in Azerbaijan in 2008-2015, that is covering three years from 2013 to 2015.
"However the country has introduced the 'Azerbaijan 2020: vision into the future' concept," he said. "We will consider it and if it is clear to us, we can prepare the programme for five years. All this is still under discussion. We cannot adopt a strategy for a longer period; say a maximum of five years."
He added that the ADB is also completing work on a business plan for 2012-2014.
"We plan to prepare it in two weeks," he added.
Noroyono told Trend earlier that improving water and sewage systems and construction of highways and improving transmission systems will be the main direction of the strategy.
Azerbaijan has been a member of the ADB since 1999. The ADB's active credit portfolio reaches $680 million. The bank has allocated grants amounting to $13.122 million to the Azerbaijan government and local companies during the period of cooperation.
ADB was established in 1966 and has 67 members. The headquarters of the bank is located in the capital of the Philippines, Manila. Azerbaijan became a member of the Asian Development Bank on December 22, 1999. The country's participation share in the bank's capital is 0.5 per cent.
Japan and the US (31.2 per cent of the total share capital), India and China (12.8 percent), Australia, South Korea and Canada (16 percent) are the ADB leading shareholders.