Citing a continuing “strong macroeconomic performance,” the World Bank announced on Friday the release of a fresh $20 million loan to Armenia
Published:
21 November 2004 y., Sunday
Citing a continuing “strong macroeconomic performance,” the World Bank announced on Friday the release of a fresh $20 million loan to Armenia that will be used for financing its government’s budget deficit.
An agreement on the disbursement of the “poverty reduction support credit” (PRSC) was signed by Finance Minister Vartan Khachatrian and the head of the World Bank’s Yerevan office, Roger Robinson. It followed a meeting of the bank’s governing board in Washington late on Wednesday.
The board’s decision also paved the way for the release of a $5 million budgetary grant to Armenian from the government of Holland.
“The project will assist the government to implement the ambitious Poverty Reduction Strategy over the coming years,” Saumya Mitra, a senior World Bank official, said in a separate statement. “It will also support the government’s drive to improve the quality in the delivery of essential public services.”
The PRSC is aimed, among other things, at “sharpening competition and entrenching property rights” in Armenia, the statement said. The credit is part of the World Bank’s new “country assistance strategy” approved last summer. Yerevan is expected to get up to $220 million in loans under the four-year program. It has already borrowed more than $800 million from the bank since independence.
World Bank loans and donor grants have been the main source of deficit-funding for the Armenian government and the next year will be no exception. The government’s 2005 budget deficit is projected at 47 billion drams ($94 million).
Robinson endorsed the main parameters of the draft budget, singling out a planned major increase in government expenditures on education, health care and social services. The government wants to spend more on education than defense.
Šaltinis:
armenialiberty.org
Copying, publishing, announcing any information from the News.lt portal without written permission of News.lt editorial office is prohibited.
The most popular articles
A specific EU budget line for the new EU stabilisation mechanism should be created as soon as possible, to ensure its credibility, Council, Commission and Parliament negotiators agreed at a three-way meeting on Wednesday.
more »
New EU rule will help phone-users avoid astronomical bills for web-surfing and downloads abroad.
more »
The Communication approved today by the Commission builds on the principles presented on 12 May to reinforce the economic governance in the European Union.
more »
Eurostat report just published shows that the crisis has brought some lower taxes.
more »
New legislation is needed to ensure fair returns to farmers and transparent prices to consumers, by enforcing fair competition throughout the food supply chain, said Agriculture Committee MEPs on Monday.
more »
Fish imports play a crucial role in supplying the European market, yet fisheries and aquaculture are strategic sectors that do not lend themselves to a purely free-trade approach, believes the EP Fisheries Committee.
more »
I will support every proposal that strengthens cooperation among the European Union's Member States and serves Lithuania's interests," President of the Republic of Lithuania Dalia Grybauskaitė said at the meeting with EU Member States' ambassadors resident in Lithuania.
more »
The fourth World Lithuanian Economic Forum “High tech innovation & investment: local to global” will start in London on 22 June.
more »
Lithuania aims for the five Nordic countries and three Baltic States to become single community of values, which would be linked by a versatile quality of democracy, security and everyday life.
more »
MEPs decided on Wednesday to create a special committee to prepare for the EU's next long-term budgetary framework.
more »