Development News 2024 Q3

Strengthening education in Uzbekistan 

Cooperation with the Islamic Development Bank and private sponsors boosts preschool education 

The OPEC Fund is extending a new US$20 million loan to support a key preschool education project by the government, setting up 200 preschools for almost 30,000 children across the Central Asian country. 

The project is co-financed by the Islamic Development Bank and private sponsors. The government’s goal is to achieve universal preschool enrollment by 2030. OPEC Fund President Abdulhamid Alkhalifa said: “The development of a modern education system is crucial for future economic growth and building human capacity. We are proud to join the government’s efforts and support its ambitious aspirations to become an upper middle-income country by 2030.” 

Expanding green energy in Uganda 

The OPEC Fund is providing a US$25 million loan to help finance the construction of a 42 MW run-of-the-river hydroelectric plant in northern Uganda as well as new electricity transmission infrastructure. 

In addition to creating jobs, the project helps the government achieve its Nationally Determined Contributions, its commitments under the Paris Agreement, which will help reduce greenhouse gasses and mitigate climate change. The project also is in line with the OPEC Fund’s Climate Action Plan. 

Supporting small businesses in Nepal 

The OPEC Fund signed a US$25 million loan agreement with Global IME Bank Nepal to increase access to financing for micro, small and medium-sized enterprises (MSMEs), including women-owned enterprises. 

Additionally, the loan will enhance the bank’s climate finance portfolio, vital for Nepal’s efforts to mitigate climate change impacts, by promoting climate-smart projects. 

The loan will help address significant financing gaps for MSMEs, which make up 95 percent of Nepal’s registered businesses and account for 45 percent of all jobs. Despite their importance, MSMEs struggle to receive funds and the financing gap for these enterprises is estimated at US$3.6 billion. 

Constructing a hospital in post-earthquake Türkiye 

A US$20 million OPEC Fund loan will help finance the cost of building a 50-bed hospital in Türkiye’s Malatya province, an area hit hard by the 2023 earthquake. The hospital will support the region in regaining its capacity to deliver health services with improved infrastructure that will be resilient to future seismic activity. 

The project is part of a larger effort to build 13 hospitals across the country that will be constructed in accordance with green, resilient and sustainable standards. The hospitals will increase the local health sector’s disaster-coordination capacity against future incidents. 

Promoting clean cooking in Somalia 

The OPEC Fund is providing more than US$42 million in loan and grant commitments to Somalia for a program focusing on debt sustainability and sustainable management of agroforestry resources with technology for clean cooking. 

A portion of the program will be devoted to transitioning households to cleaner cooking alternatives and developing more sustainable livelihoods for rural communities relying on agroforestry outputs, which includes redeploying resources away from the environmentally harmful charcoal production. 

Developing Rwanda’s dairy industry 

The aim of the OPEC Fund’s US$20 million loan is to increase the productivity and resilience of smallholder dairy production systems. The project also aims to increase the efficiency of the dairy value chain through scale-up investments, improved market access and the promotion of dairy products. 

Access to animal feed and water for livestock will be improved and training and service programs will introduce climate-smart practices and nature-based solutions. The program will benefit 175,000 poor and nutrition-insecure rural households and will target a significant proportion of women and youth beneficiaries.