September 21st, 2005, the board of directors of the African Development Bank ( ADB) approved on Wednesday a 117 million euro loan intended to finance the third program of support for the competitiveness in Tunisia, aiming at helping the country to realize a rate of annual growth of 5,2 % for the period 2005-2006.
The program will lean on three fundamental and interdependent orientations of the policy of the government in economic development, aiming at insuring a greater participation of the private sector in the realization of the investments within the framework of the Economic and Social Development Plan.
These orientations are the following:
– At first, maintain a stable and reactive macroeconomic framework, essentially through the fiscal consolidation and the strenghening of the medium-term budgetary frame of Tunisia.
– Improve the environment of the private investment and promote new opportunities of investment;
Then, strengthen the contribution of the financial sector to the financing of the growth by supporting the implemented measures of recovering of the non successful loans of the banking system by provisions and by developing alternative sources of financing, notably the capital markets.
The combined effect of these measures will have a positive impact on the competitiveness of the private sector and the economic growth, contributing to the job creation and the lowering of the poverty. The program represents an important means of institutional development both in the directly concerned sectors and at the level of the Tunisian administration itself.
It will contribute to a net improvement of the quality of the environment of the private investment, through the improvement of the quality and the availability of the financial information on companies and will integrate the equality of chance and access into employment.
The needs of financing in Tunisia is approximately of 3249 million $ E.U for 2005 and 3 576 million $E.U. for 2006. A cover of these needs ifrom external resources is foreseen, mainly, by the payments of the public and private loans in average and long term for 1904 millin $ E.U, the foreign direct investments for 1560 millions$ E.U, And the donations for the balance of 240 million US dollars. The World Bank and the European Union will support the financing of the Third Program of Competitiveness by 150 millionUS dollars and of 78 million euro respectively.
The operations of the ADB in Tunisia began in June, 1968. To date, the ADB committed it a 1,84 billion dollar total amount for 54 operations.
