WB nods on an additional support for transport infrastructure

Transport infrastructure in the Mekong Delta has been upgraded in recent years

The project aims to reduce congestion along key transport corridors in the Mekong Delta as well as enhance the connectivity of the poor to the routes.

The additional financing will be used to improve the standard of national trunk roads connecting the main economic hub of the Mekong Delta as well as trunk waterways connecting the Northern and Coastal Delta areas to Can Tho and Ho Chi Minh City. It will also be used to upgrade feeder roads, ports, and landing stages at the district and provincial levels in the Mekong Delta, thus enhance the connectivity of poorer and more distant producer communities.

When completed by the end of 2015, the project would reduce the average time of transporting rice on waterway from Rach Gia to Ho Chi Minh City to 5 hours, the average time of travelling for lorries on National Highway 91 to 10%. It is also expected to reduce the death rate caused by traffic accident on the National Highway 91 by 15% and the rate of water way accident by 5%.

The loan comes from the International Development Association – the bank’s concessional lending arm for low-income country.  The interest rate for this loan is 1.25% per annum with 25 years maturity including a grace period of five years.

The original project is co-financed by the Australian Agency for International Development (AusAID) through a $25 million equivalent grant and AusAID has approved an additional grant of $15 million, under the AusAID-World Bank Strategic Partnership in Viet Nam to this additional financing.

By Ngoc Van