World Bank applauds Vietnam’s rural finance project
Vietnam’s Rural Finance Project II (RFP II) has contributed 20 – 30 percent to reducing poverty in northern mountainous provinces and has brought a number of improvements to these localities.
A delegation from the World Bank supervising the project gave this assessment at a meeting with the Deputy Governor of Vietnam’s State Bank Nguyen Van Binh in Hanoi on May 15.
The RFP II has also introduced several measures to manage the environment, including raising public awareness and to raise people’s living standards.
The project manager, the Bank for Investment and Development of Vietnam (BIDV) and reported that RFP II’s capital has risen from 200 million USD to 235 million USD due to fluctuations in the price of SDR/USD and by March 31, 99 percent of the total capital had been disbursed.
The project financed more than 409,000 small projects in 60 provinces and cities nationwide.
The same day, WB and BIDV and eight other financial institutions signed a sub-loan contract to launch the third phase of the Rural Finance Project thanks to loans from the WB.
The RFP III will receive a 200 million USD loan from the WB.
The project will be launched in every locality nationwide except for Hanoi, Hai Phong, Da Nang and HCM City, and aims to help households and private businesses in rural areas get access to financial sources to boost agricultural and rural development.
The project’s disbursement period is scheduled to end by December 2013.
It is estimated that about 110,000 rural households and businesses could get access to the capital and 150,000 new jobs will be generated.
VIETNAMPLUS
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