Vietnam to Seek to Borrow $150M from WB for Poverty Reduction

Prime Minister Nguyen Tan Dung has approved to set up a delegation of state agencies, led by the State Bank of Vietnam, to make negotiations on borrowing $150 million from the World Bank to fund a poverty reduction project. The central bank said in a statement that the negotiations will start in Washington D.C. in early February. The negotiations aim to raise funds for the second phase of the World Bank-funded project to reduce poverty rate in six northern mountainous provinces of Lao Cai, Yen Bai, Hoa Binh, Son La, Dien Bien and Lai Chau. The delegation will include representatives of the Presidential Office, the Government Office, the Ministry of Planning and Investment, the Ministry of Finance, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Ministry of Justice and those provincial people’s committees. In late 2009, WB approved a $500-million loan from the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development (IBRD) to support stimulus effort and public investment reform in Vietnam. The loan which has a maturity of 25 years is the largest ever made by the WB to the Southeast Asian country and the first by IBRD, the low-interest lending arm of the WB. With the newly-approved loan, Vietnam has moved a step closer to its goal of reaching middle-income status by 2010. The WB has pledged to provide $2.498 billion in official development assistance (ODA) for Vietnam this year.