Saudi fund to back solar street lighting project in CAR's capital Bangui

The Saudi Fund for Development (SFD) will provide a loan to finance a solar street lighting project in Bangui, the capital and the largest city in the Central African Republic (CAR).

An agreement has been signed by SPD's chief executive Sultan bin Abdulrahman Al-Marshad and CAR's economy minister Felix Moloa on the sidelines of the annual meetings of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank in Washington.

The agreed financing will be used to install lighting poles, lamps and solar panels combined with batteries as well as controllers for 70 km (43.5 mi) of the road network in the capital city, the government's Saudi Press Agency (SPA) said on Thursday.

The volume of the loan was not disclosed.

The project is not the first initiative in the African country to be supported by the Saudi fund. Since 1985, SFD has provided five development loans to the country to fund projects in the areas of transport, healthcare, education, energy, agriculture and infrastructure totalling about USD 94 million (EUR 96.5m).

SFD is a government agency created in 1974 to provide loans and grants to finance development projects and programmes in developing countries.

(USD 1 = EUR 1.027)

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