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By Darwin G. Amojelar
, Reporter
THE government will borrow huge
amounts of money from the two largest multilateral institutions this
year to fund infrastructure projects and social services, an
official of the National Economic and Development Authority (NEDA)
said Thursday.
Jonathan Uy, NEDA’s director
for public investment staff, said in an interview that the agency is
programming loan assistance for the country for the year 2007 and
2008.
Uy said that the government is
targeting $835-million loan assistance from World Bank’s Country
Strategy Program (CSP) starting July 2007 to June 2008 to finance
the Philippines’ water-supply projects, transport, financial
sectors, irrigations, road and agrarian reforms.
In December the government
obtained the first development policy loan (DPL) amounting $250
million from the World Bank.
World Bank provides DPLs on the
basis of good economic management and policy reforms.
Uy said that the government plans
to borrow about $767 million from Asian Development Bank’s (ADB)
Country Assistance Strategy (CAS), which are intended for lending
and nonlending initiatives this year. Nonlending assistance refers
to technical assistance given by ADB to the country.
“We are looking at urban
services, health sector, agrarian reform, intermodal transport,
budget support for local government and judicial reforms for ADB
loan assistance,” Uy said.
In December ADB approved a
$450-million loan for restructuring the country’s power sector,
and another $200 million to develop the local financial sector.
The loan, which will mature in 15
years, includes a three-year grace period.
The Department of Finance will be
executing agency for the loan, which is tentatively programmed to
run for four years to 2010.
The country’s cumulative ODA
loan commitments as of September amounted to $8.28 billion compared
with $10.2 billion in 2005.
The JBIC continues to be the
biggest source of loans with $4.73 billion, comprising 57 percent of
total ODA, followed by other sources with 16 percent, or $1.3
billion, ADB with $1.14 billion and WB with $1.11 billion.
--Darwin G. Amojelar
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