Ammon News - JT
Jordan and Kuwait on Sunday signed four agreements to finance projects in key sectors worth $259.5 million.
The agreements were signed by Minister of Planning and International Cooperation Jafar Hassan and the Kuwait Fund for Arab Economic Development (KFAED) Director General Abdul Wahab Al Bader at the planning ministry headquarters in Amman.

The funding is part of Kuwait’s $1.25 billion contribution to the Kingdom under a $5 billion Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) grant to Jordan, spread over five years.
Hassan indicated that the funded schemes will be included in the state budget of 2013.

He explained that the first agreement will be directed to financing projects in the education sector worth $67.2 million. It will include renovating and furnishing schools and linking the Kingdom’s schools electronically, among other programmes.

The second accord, the minister said, involves over $84 million to support water and irrigation projects that include schemes in the Wadi Araba area, rehabilitation of dams and upgrading water networks in the northern governorates of Irbid and Mafraq.

The largest share of the funds under the third agreement, over $104 million, will go to the health sector, Hassan said, adding the fourth accord is to support the energy sector at a value of $3.4 million.

On December 11, the two sides signed three financing agreements valued at $695 million in total to fund projects in the fields of housing, development of municipalities and governorates, and transportation.

Signing the agreements, Hassan said, will enable the government to start dispersing the funds to carry out development projects that aim at improving services offered to people and creating more jobs for Jordanians.

He added that the GCC grants will help the Kingdom reduce the deficit in the budget, particularly spending on capital projects.

Bader noted that the KFAED will disperse a total of $50 million by the end of this week, while the rest of the grants will be available during the first quarter of 2013.
He pointed out that a team from the fund will visit the Kingdom during that period to study energy projects and a proposal to build a special terminal for gas imports in the port city of Aqaba