Municipality development
ADB to provide $200m to Bangladesh
BSS
Asian Development Bank (ADB) will provide US $200 million to Bangladesh to strengthen urban governance and improve urban infrastructures and service delivery in pourashavas (municipalities) across the country, reports BSS.
The ADB fund will develop pourashavas with high growth potential in an integrated and holistic way both in terms of governance and infrastructure with an aim at making them model towns of the country, an Economic Relation Division (ERD) official told the news agency yesterday.
A loan agreement to this end will be signed on September 19 at the NEC-II Conference Room at the ERD in the capitals Sher-e-Bangla Nagar area. ERD Secretary Kazi Shofiqul Azam and ADB Country Director Kazuhiko Higuchi will sign the agreement on behalf of their respective sides.
After the successful implementation of earlier phases, the project titled Third Urban Governance and Infrastructure Improvement (Sector) Project (UGIIP-3)-Additional Financing will provide investment funds to 35 pourashavas based on their governance performance.
In addition to the focused interventions to these towns, the project will roll out application of governance performance criteria linked with fund allocation to all class-A pourashavas, in the country.
ADB will provide the loan to develop urban roads and traffic management and to ensure water and other urban infrastructures and services of pourashavas for environmentally sustainable and inclusive economic growth.
The other urban services are urban flood protection, urban policy, institutional and capacity development, urban sanitation, urban slum development, urban solid waste management and urban water supply.
In the governments Seventh Five-Year Plan (2016-2020), urban development is a national priority to reduce urban poverty and improve living conditions through better city governance and service improvement.
