The Ministry of Transport of Azerbaijan and the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) signed in Guba region a credit agreement on financing the Baku-Samur (Russian border) highway reconstruction project, the Transport Ministry secretary Namig Hasanov told Trend.
According to him, the document from the Azerbaijani side was signed by the Transport Minister Ziya Mammadov, from the EBRD side вЂ"the head of the Bank’s transport department Ricardo Puliti. Officials of the Minsitry, representatives of EBRD Linn Ogregy, Reymond Conway and other took part in the signing ceremony.
EBRD allocates $100 million for the project of funding and rehabilitation of the road section from Sumgayit till Zorat settlement of the highway Baku-the Russian border. The Bank will allocate the loan for 15 years with the 3-year preferential period and LIBOR+1% rate.
The Baku-Samur highway has a total length of about 197 km. EBRD will fund it from the 28-th to 89-th km. The financing of the remaining part of the section will be performed by Eximbank of Czechia, which granted a loan of $180 million for 14 years with the 4-year privileged period and the LIBOR+0,6% rate for the project implementation. The total amount of the project is some $280 million.
The recipient of the assistance is the Department of Road Transport Services of the Azerbaijan’s Transport Ministry, which manages and services 18,723 thousand km of roads in the country. 4-6 regional sectors of the department will be set up, service level agreements will be introduced. They will enable to involve the local potential to road works. The control for distribution of such contracts will be performed by the Road Advisory Board. Technical assistance will be involved for development of contracts.