THE Asian Development Bank (ADB) has, for over five decades, committed public sector loans, grants, and technical assistance with a cumulative amount of $21.9 billion to the Philippines, a document released by the multilateral bank agency showed.
According to the ADB’s latest Fact Sheet on the Philippines posted in its website yesterday, cumulative loan and grant disbursements to the Philippines since 1966 amount to $15.67 billion. These were financed by regular and concessional ordinary capital resources, and other special funds.
ADB’s annual lending to the Philippines reached a record high of $2.5 billion in 2019, mainly due to the support for the Build, Build, Build (BBB) infrastructure development program.
“The ADB has been a strong partner in the development of the Philippines, the bank’s host country, and is one of its largest sources of official development assistance, with average annual lending of $952 million over the past 10 years to 2019,” the bank said.
The document showed that bulk of the cumulative lending, grant, and technical assistance commitments from 1966 to end-2019 to the Philippines goes to public sector management, with a share of 26.76 percent.
This is followed by the transport and energy sectors, with shares of 16.24 percent and 15.61 percent, respectively.
ADB said its future assistance to the Philippines will focus on larger investments in fewer sectors, to closely align with the government’s strategic priorities.
“The bank has rebalanced its financing program to infrastructure in support of the government’s BBB program, local economic development, and social investments to help the bottom 40 percent of the population,” ADB said.
“Apart from infrastructure support, lending operations will be devoted to social services, agriculture, public sector management, tourism development, and sustainable water and urban development,” it added.
