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Showing posts with label ADB. Show all posts
Showing posts with label ADB. Show all posts

Saturday, 15 August 2015

08:31

ADB to carry out study for financing Road-cum-Rail Link between India and Sri Lanka

ADB to carry out study for financing Road-cum-Rail Link between India and Sri Lanka

Minister of State for Road Transport and Highways Mr.P.Radhakrishnan urged Ministry of Railways to also plan for development of “Multifunctional/Multi-Model Logistics Park” at Thalaimannar in Sri Lanka, with the help of CONCOR that helps to improve the Trade and Commerce relationship between the two countries, stating that the proposed Rail-cum-Road Link will act as a strong Economic Corridor for both the countries for this century

New Delhi: The Government of India today said that the Asian Development Bank has been asked to carry out pre-feasibility study for financing road and rail link across Palk Strait between India and Sri Lanka. Stating this in a written reply in the Lok Sabha today, Minister of State for Road Transport and Highways P Radhakrishnan said that the project is in the conceptual stage and is subject to approval of government of Sri Lanka.

The Minister said that once the report from ADB is received, the same will be shared by the Indian government with the Sri Lanka Government for further examination.

Mr.Radhakrishnan said that both countries felt that not only there is an urgent need to enhancing of trade, commerce and bilateral relationships between the two countries, but also the collaboration in innovation, knowledge sharing, Science & Technology, Space Sciences, Communication, Information Technology and ICT, Agricultural cooperation, Research and Development etc for the betterment of the region in particular. The envisaged Road-cum-Rail line project between India and Sri Lanka will facilitate heightened economic cooperation in this important region of Southeast Asia, the Minister said.

Minister also urged Ministry of Railways to plan for development of a Multifunctional/Multi-Model Logistics Park near Thalaimannar in Sri Lanka for better movement of goods and supplies through Freight containers. He said that this initiative by Ministry of Railways will enhance the Trade and Commerce between the two countries and Rail-cum-Road Link will help speedier transportation of freight logistics by rail and road mode, and serves as the key Economic Corridor for both the countries.

The Minister also urged Confederation of Indian Industry, FICCI and other Organisations to engage with Sri Lanka in greater detail, for development of the industries covering the manufacturing, agro-products, life sciences, agriculture, Information Technology, heavy industries and the other core sectors.
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Monday, 29 June 2015

05:34

Bangladesh to get $505 Million in Loan from ADB for improvement of Rail system

Bangladesh to get $505 Million in Loan from ADB for improvement of Rail system

Dhaka: The Asian Development Bank (ADB) and the government of Bangladesh on Sunday signed agreements for $505 million in loans to further improve the country’s railways that will help the national economy and boost subregional trade.

Mohammad Mejbahuddin, Senior Secretary, Economic Relations Division (ERD), and Kazuhiko Higuchi, Country Director, Bangladesh Resident Mission of ADB, signed the agreements in Dhaka.

“The assistance will help railways better serve needs of people and movement of goods, and help improve domestic and subregional trade,” said Higuchi.

“This project will also help improve the overall railway transport system in Bangladesh, and aims to reduce transport costs and improve logistics of strategic corridors, such as Dhaka–Chittagong link, for subregional trade.” he added.

The South Asia Subregional Economic Cooperation (SASEC) Railway Connectivity Project will help upgrade the 72-kilometer Akhaura–Laksam section of the Dhaka–Chittagong railway corridor to a double track dual-gauge railway line, along with modern signaling equipment.

The existing track will be upgraded in accordance with the requirements of the Trans Asia Railways network. Eleven railway stations will be reconstructed with special facilities for the elderly, women, children, and disabled.

The project will also support capacity development for the permanent project management unit to be established in Bangladesh Railway and for accessing climate mitigation funding.

The Akhaura-Laksam section is part of a major subregional corridor and of the Trans-Asia Railway network. The project was endorsed by the SASEC Trade Facilitation and Transport Working Group in a meeting held in Singapore on 30 October, 2013.

The total project cost is $805 million. The European Investment Bank (EIB) will cofinance the project with $175 million while the government of Bangladesh will provide $125 million. The project will be executed by Bangladesh Railway and is expected to be completed by 2022.
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Wednesday, 13 May 2015

11:23

Govt in discussions with World Bank and ADB for a funding mechanism to fast track Rail projects

Govt in discussions with World Bank and ADB for a funding mechanism to fast track Rail projects

New Delhi; With capacity expansion a priority for Indian Railways (IR), the government is in discussion with the World Bank and Asian Development Bank (ADB) for a funding mechanism to fast track railway projects.

IR, senior officials told, could form a company or float a fund. “Discussion is on but we aim to get the funds flowing this year,” said one.

Last week, Finance Minister Arun Jaitley had said India’s partnership with ADB should move to a higher level. At the first business session of its 48th annual meet, at Baku in Azerbaijan, he sought its “deeper engagement” for developing smart cities, industrial corridors and railways, as part of the government’s flagship initiatives such as ‘Make In India’ and ‘Skill India’.IR says it has a shelf of pending projects originally estimated to cost Rs 491,510 crore. Of these, priorities such as doubling, new lines, gauge conversion, traffic facilities and electrification is estimated at Rs 208,054 crore. Officials said such prioritization can ensure a sustained flow of funds and focused attention given for completion. These will have a direct bearing on line capacity, ensuring higher earning and asset utilisation.

IR has identified 77 projects worth around Rs 1 lakh crore for being taken up in the first instance. Most of these are line doubling projects, where utilisation is more than 100 per cent of capacity. “One round of meeting with railway public sector units (PSUs) has already happened,” said an official.

Suresh Prabhu, the minister, had in his budget speech this February said IR would spend Rs 8.5 lakh crore over five years. “Around Rs 2.5 lakh crore of this would be raised as debt. This includes rolling stock financing through IRFC (the rail finance corporation). As the ministry cannot borrow, we are arranging debt either through IRFC or PSUs,” the official said. Lending from multilateral agencies would come through gross budgetary support from the ministry of finance, he added.Freight corridor

The World Bank, it has already been decided, is to fund a stretch of the 1,800-km eastern arm of the Dedicated Freight Corridor (DFC) project. The money is being planned in three tranches, for the stretches of Khurja-Kanpur, Kanpur-Mughalsarai and Khurja-Ludhiana.

Financing for the 725 km section between Ludhiana and Mughalsarai will be undertaken over three phases by the Bank. The first tranche of this loan, aggregating to $975 million (Rs 6,250 crore), has been signed.Another multilateral lending agency, Japan International Cooperation Agency (Jica), is funding the western corridor of DFC.

It is providing ¥677 billion (Rs 36,200 crore) as a loan to finance both construction and procurement of locomotives, on soft terms, for 40 years, with a payment moratorium of 10 years. The agreement for a first tranche of ¥90.2 bn for construction between Rewari and Vadodara and funding for Phase-II (Vadodara-Navi Mumbai port) for ¥266 bn has been signed.
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Tuesday, 14 April 2015

08:15

We kept a Hawk-Eye in implementation of our Budget promises and timely Rollout of Projects: Suresh Prabhu

New Delhi: In his first interview after presenting the rail budget, railway minister Suresh Prabhu tells that he is keeping a hawk-eye on implementing the budget promises and has put in place a mechanism for timely rollout of projects in the state-run transporter (Courtesy: TOI)

What view has the ministry taken on the Bibek Debroy panel report?

Bibek Debroy and his colleagues submitted the report to me only on Thursday and according to them, this is a draft report and they said these are not final recommenda tions. So, we have to wait for the final report. I have suggested that they should also seek views from our employees and our unions because sometimes, the communication gap leads to misunderstand ing. They also agree with that.

Rail reforms are very difficult considering that railways has 13 lakh employees and they have rejected the report.

Wait for the final report. Debroy was telling me that some reports which have appeared as recommendations have some communication gap.

In the budget, you talked about attracting pension funds for railway infrastructure. What is the progress?

First, money is not the only mission of railways. Railways is not a bank. We need money only to meet our capital requirement which we estimated at Rs 8.50 lakh crore over five years. Right now, we don’t need money for the current year. We have already got Rs 1.50 lakh crore from LIC. We are in talks with World Bank, IFC and ADB for more money. In our budget, we talked about Rs 1.50 lakh crore for station development which is completely coming out of private sector so I don’t have to arrange money for that. Then, there are two untapped sources.

One is tax free bonds which the FM has talked about in his budget speech for the first time, and the second is India Infrastructure Development Fund which aims to raise Rs 2 lakh crore in five years. So, we can draw around 50% of this amount. Plus, we have al ready signed an agreement with coal ministry and are in talks with other ministries and NTPC so that (freight) customers can pool in money. Plus, finance ministry has been giving money regularly, around Rs 60,000 crore per year, so that itself will become Rs 3 lakh crore in five years. All the money crore in five years. A put together is more than what is required.

Also, pension funds, sovereign wealth funds and other options are there. We are in talks with Japanese, Chinese and Canadian pension funds. We can use these resources for development of other infrastructure

Are you talking about the infrastructure fund that finance minister mentioned?

In Japan, the rate of interest is very , very low, in fact, more or less flat for a long time because the economy is not growing, inflation is very low. So, they are facing a double whammy -low inflation and low demand. They need to invest outside and this meets our require ment. Look at China’s sovereign wealth fund. It is worth $4 trillion.We are offering something which is not soft financing or bilateral help. This is purely on commercial consideration for investment into another market which benefits them. Canada has the same problem, $2 trillion of pension fund which is more than the size of its economy. They have to invest out side.Fund availability for India’s infrastructure is going to be immense.

I can tell you something interesting on what we can do. We have public sector units which have very good balancesheets. When they execute a project, the advantage is they will be able to raise resources on their own balance-sheet. They can borrow from their own balance-sheet and they can leverage.

What is the progress on decongesting the network?

Today is the 10th day of the new financial year and I am very happy to say that each and every budget announcement has been made into actionable points and we have already reviewed it three times. We are trying to monitor the implementation at three levels. I have asked my colleague minister (MoS) to monitor it regularly. Chairman of railway board has been directed to take feedback from board members every 15 days. Another layer is online monitoring. Two kinds of monitoring, one is for project implementation, other is for non project implementation such as food quality. For projects, it will go through various phases of approvals. Our target is to get work started in September. We are targeting implementation but completion will not happen before three years.

Do you think it is possible to fulfill these big ideas under the current railway board structure?

Each and every idea in the budget speech is under implementation and through the same system. In the last 10 days, I have had meetings with five zones which account for 70% of the freight traffic. In the last 10 days, I visited 10 states and met general managers, divisional railway managers. They are extremely excited to work on these ideas. I don’t see any issue in terms of railway board and, in fact, railway board chairman is monitoring it.
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