Minister: NDB BRICS approves financing of first 4 projects

WASHINGTON, Apr 15 (PRIME) -- The New Development Bank BRICS (NDB BRICS) has approved the financing of the first four projects, Russian Finance Minister Anton Siluanov told reporters on Friday after a meeting with the International Monetary Fund (IMF).

“The bank has confirmed its commitment to green technologies: it considered projects consistent with the focus on infrastructure and green qualities. These are energy, solar energy, green technologies projects. Yesterday, the board of directors decided on shortlisting the projects and today these decisions have been confirmed by the management board,” Siluanov said.

The chosen projects will get loans from the NDB BRICS for 20 years. Each country participant presented one project, Siluanov said.

The minister also said that the executives of the NDB BRICS have approved placement of 5-year bonds in yuan on the Chinese market. The bank will borrow on other markets as well after getting an international credit rating, he said.

The NDB BRICS, launched in July 2015, is aimed at financing infrastructure projects in BRICS, or Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa, and developing countries. The paid-in capital of the bank is U.S. $10 billion; it can be later raised to $40 billion. The maximum permitted capital of the bank stands at $100 billion.

Siluanov said that the NDB BRICS will define the conditions of acceptance of new member countries in July–December 2017. No concrete proposals to join are considered now.

He also said that BRICS’ finance ministers have agreed on a consolidated position regarding the IMF reform. “We need to have a common position regarding the revision of quotas and recalculation of quotas, firstly based on gross domestic product (GDP) figures calculated based on the purchasing power parity.”

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