Baku, Azerbaijan, May 2
By Anvar Mammadov - Trend:
The Board of Governors of the Asian Development Bank (ADB) has supported the initiative of uniting the credit operations of Asian Development Fund and the ADB's Ordinary Capital Resources, ADB President Takehiko Nakao told reporters May 2.
He said that such unification will make it possible to increase the annual budget on the total capital resources and grants by 50 percent, which means up to $20 billion.
"The consolidation of resources will also allow increasing ADB's aid to poor countries by 70 percent," said Nakao. "Poor countries along with the means of Asian Development Fund (ADF), will also have access to soft loans of ADB's Ordinary Capital Resources."
This initiative does not provide for the elimination of the ADF, which will retain the function of the donor to provide grants to countries that need them.
Nakao said that under the new initiative it is planned to increase the volume of funding at the expense of ordinary capital resources till January 2017 by 3 times - from $17 to $53 billion.
In the following years, it is also expected to increase the annual ADB's aid from $23 billion to $40 billion, according to Nakao.
"This initiative can be perceived as a victory, since it will increase the amount of financial aid to member countries with low income, as well as projects and operations in the private sector with an average yield," said Nakao.
ADB was founded in 1966 and has 67 members. The bank's headquarters is located in Manila, the capital of the Philippines. Azerbaijan became ADB member on December 22, 1999. The country's share in the bank's capital is 0.5 percent.
ADB's leading shareholders are Japan and the United States (31.2 percent of the total share capital), India and China (12.8 percent), Australia, South Korea and Canada (16 percent) and so on.
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