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Azerbaijan, World Bank sign additional financing for Rural Investment Project

20 April 2009 16:46 (UTC +04:00)

Baku. Rashad Suleymanov â€“ APA-Economics. The Government of Azerbaijan and the World Bank have signed an additional loan agreement for the Rural Investment Project for Azerbaijan. The agreement was signed by Azerbaijanâ€™s Minister of Agriculture Ismat Abasov and World Bank Country Manager for Azerbaijan Gregory Jedrzejczak.

The US$15 million IDA Credit comes for 35 years with a grace period of 10 years.
The aim of this additional financing is to scale up assistance to households in rural communities-completing micro-project investments-to achieve improved living standards through improved access to infrastructure services.

Initially, the credit was $21.1 million, including $15 million from the World Bank Group, $3.3 million from the Government of Japan as a grant, $1.45 million from local communities and $1.35 million from the borrower (the Government of Azerbaijan).

The Rural Investment Project for Azerbaijan aims to help households in rural communities complete micro-project investments to improve living standards and aims to increase the use of infrastructure services.

The project has two main components plus a project management Component. Component A, Infrastructure, funds grants for approximately 350-450 rural infrastructure micro-projects. It identifies, designs, and constructs or rehabilitates rural infrastructure, based on the priority needs identified by communities. Potential investments include basic economic and social infrastructure ( e g , rehabilitation of secondary roads, water systems, electricity transformers, schools and health clinics). Component B, Capacity enhancement, funds training and technical assistance for project implementation.

It consists of two sub-components: Sub-component B-1 will help create the required capacity of involved local stakeholders, e.g. communities, recipients, and Regional Grant Approval Committees (RGACs). In the community mobilization phase, communities and recipients will be assisted in all aspects of micro-project development including completing problem analysis, needs assessments/prioritizations, and proposal preparation. Recipients will receive training in contracting, procurement, financial management, and participatory monitoring and evaluation (PM&E). Sub-component B- 1 also comprises a broad dissemination campaign which targets stakeholders at large and includes rayon and central government authorities. Sub-component B-2 will finance the long term professional staff and the short-term contract staff in the Regional Operations Offices (ROOs) to build the capacity of the Agency for Support of the Development of the Agricultural Private Sector (ASDAPS) and the government. Sub-component B-2 will also develop the capacity of the project management unit and three ROOs to appraise, supervise, monitor and evaluate the micro-projects (including participatory M&E).