The Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) says Guyana, “one of the best-conserved high-biodiversity countries in the world,” will advance in its efforts to implement its Low-Carbon Development Strategy with a US$16.9 million loan.
The Washington-based financial institution said on Dec. 5 that the financing is the first of two Programmatic Policy-Based Loans to support the creation of regulatory, institutional and monitoring instruments to help Guyana implement its development plan and mainstream environmental issues into institutional strategies.
The IDB said Guyana has about 85 percent of its territory covered by forest and wooded lands.
It said the project will support measures to update the country’s regulatory framework to maintain low rates of deforestation and forest degradation caused by mining, logging and agriculture, as well as to improve the government’s institutional capacity to enforce legislation.
Moreover, the IDB said the project will support measures to strengthen the institutional capacity of the Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment, the main entity in charge of promoting and implementing the country’s low carbon development plan.
“This project is designed to foster the creation of government systems to measure, report and verify forest carbon emissions resulting from deforestation and forest degradation,” the IDB said.
The IDB financing is made up of two loans of US$8.46 million each. The first loan comes from the IDB’s ordinary capital, with a 30-year maturity, and a 5.5-year grace period and a fixed interest rate (SCF-Fixed).
The IDB said the second loan comes from the Bank’s Fund for Special Operations, with an interest rate of 0.25 percent a year, and a 40-year maturity and grace period.
The IDB also approved this week a US$3.8 million non-reimbursable technical cooperation to Guyana to support measures to help the country establish an enabling framework and to build capacity for Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation (REDD+).
