The Asian Development Bank (ADB) signed on Jan. 22 agreements to lend Vietnam $165 million to improve secondary education for ethnic minority students in poorest areas, and to upgrade rural infrastructure in central provinces. The first loan, worth $80 million, is earmarked for the second phase of the Secondary Education Sector Development Program, an ADB-funded project helping improve education in the most disadvantaged areas in Vietnam, with the first phase completed in late 2014. With a six-year implementation period starting in early 2015, the second phase aims at building 660 classrooms, 350 boarding facilities, and 250 houses for teachers; training around 24,000 teachers; and constructing 344 new schools in the country’s poverty-hit localities. The second loan of $85 million provides additional financing for the Integrated Rural Development Infrastructure Sector Project, approved in October 2007, which targets critical rural infrastructure in 13 provinces in the central region. The ADB had previously provided $90 million to the first phase of the program. The $85 million funding will be allocated to its implementation in Binh Dinh, Binh Thuan, Ha Tinh, Ninh Thuan, Phu Yen, and Thua Thien-Hue in four years. The ADB’s assistance in Vietnam amounted to $12.85 billion from 1993, when it resumed operations in the Southeast Asian country, to December 2013, according to an ADB fact sheet. The assistance includes 150 loans totaling $12.43 billion, 276 technical assistance projects amounting to $253.5 million, and 29 grants worth $170 million. (Thoi Bao Kinh Doanh – Business Times Jan 26 p2, Thoi Bao Kinh Te Viet Nam – Vietnam Economic Times Jan 26 p3, Thoi Bao Ngan Hang – Banking Times Jan 26 p2)
