Junior Finance Minister Discusses World Bank Loans

Christopher Coye

On Monday, Minister of State Chris Coye held a press conference to apprise the media of developments arising from a round of meetings held with the World Bank Group, including the likelihood of Belize being able to access concessionary loans through the International Investment Association.  Here’s more from that discussion.

Christopher Coye, Minister of State, Finance

“It’s the development arm of the World Bank Group, its resources are primarily used for the very low income countries.  The way that they determine who becomes eligible for IDA is by way of an income per capita threshold.  So countries that are below that threshold, they become eligible, countries that are above that threshold are not eligible.  Once again, in terms of that type of finance, that’s extremely concessionary and quite a bit of it, actually, are grants.  But you also have the loans, or the concessionary loans, you’re talking about one percent or less than one percent because those are tied to the SDR rates, Special Drawing Rights, and on top, those are forty-year loans.  So once again, those are development loans but now there is a transformation of the World Bank that’s ongoing that’s looking at climate.  I think the new vision is to free the world of poverty on a livable planet.”