CAF development bank loans $2.7 billion across Latin America, Caribbean

Reuters

CAF development bank loans $2.7 billion across Latin America, Caribbean

2024 7월 18, 오후 8:45 GMT

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Adds detail on Caribbean expansion in paragraphs 9-11

July 18 (Reuters) -The Development Bank of Latin America and the Caribbean (CAF) has allocated $2.74 billion in loans across nine countries in the region to help fuel their energy transition, shore up their ecosystems and improve infrastructure, it said on Thursday.

The bank also signed humanitarian aid agreements for three nations, six credit deals for Ecuador totaling $483 million and added the small island developing state of Antigua and Barbuda to its ranks, the CAF said in a statement.

"The Board of Directors at Lima was historic," CAF Executive PresidentSergio Diaz-Granados said in a statement.

"All of this is a sign of CAF's commitment to double its portfolio by 2030, something that will allow us to contribute even more to the development plans of our member countries and accelerate regional integration."

CAF approved financing projects in Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Colombia, Chile, Ecuador, El Salvador, Honduras and Peru.

It also destined humanitarian aid to address damages from a fire at a Honduran hospital, support Ecuador's response to heavy rainfall and to Barbados to tackle storm damages, it said.

The Venezuela-based lender is among the region's top sources of multilateral financing.

The announcement comes early on in the Atlantic hurricane season, which has brought deadly rains across Central America and a hurricane which leaders estimated caused hundreds of millions of dollars in damages across the eastern Caribbean.

CAF has been expanding in the Caribbean, incorporating earlier this year the Bahamas, Dominica and Grenada - which together with Saint Vincent and the Grenadines and Jamaica were especially hard-hit byHurricane Beryl, the season's first.

Caribbean leaders have called for better financing options for small nations bearing the brunt of the impacts of climate change, saying existing structures do not provide enough and release funds too slowly to help citizens during disasters .

CAF said the Caribbean expansion was a mark of its growing regional influence and pointed out it was committed to addressing "the unique needs of Caribbean islands and small states, which are disproportionately affected by the impacts of climate change."

Reporting by Sarah Morland and Nelson Renteria; Editing by Kylie Madry, Aida Pelaez-Fernandez and Diane Craft

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