ADB, WB Pledge $22B for Development Projects in Vietnam So Far

The Asian Development Bank (ADB) and World Bank (WB) have pledged a total of $22 billion for 220 development projects and programs in Vietnam since 1993, the Governor Nguyen Van Binh of the State Bank of Vietnam said.  Binh released the information at a recent meeting with international monetary-financial organizations and foreign credit organizations in the capital city of Hanoi.  Vietnam is likely to negotiate and sign 11 projects and programs totaling $986.4 million with ADB and 14 capitalized at over $2 billion with WB this year, the governor noted.  The funding has contributed to helping the Vietnamese government to carry out the projects in infrastructure, economic development, poverty reduction and social security, he elaborated.   Earlier, the Philippines-based lender ADB said it would arrange loans worth $1.3 billion for the Southeast Asian country in the coming years and speed up the public-private partnership (PPP) model. Meanwhile, the biggest multilateral donor WB pledged $2 billion in official development assistance (ODA) for Vietnam in 2012. Vietnam is one of the five countries that have received the biggest ODA capital in the world. However, disbursement rate of ODA in the communist country is lower than the world’s average. The ODA is one of the key sources of dollars for Vietnam, after exports, foreign direct investment (FDI) and remittances. However, experts said that Vietnam should reduce the use of ODA to improve efficiency and avoid a debt burden in the future. (sbv.gov.vn Dec 17)