Our Correspondent
Kohima, April 12 (EMN): A Project Readiness Financing (PRF) loan to improve urban infrastructure and services in 16 district headquarters of Nagaland was signed on Tuesday.
The $2 million PRF loan was signed between the Government of India and the Asian Development Bank (ADB).
The signatories to the proposed Nagaland Urban Infrastructure Development Project were Rajat Kumar Mishra, Additional Secretary, Department of Economic Affairs, Ministry of Finance who signed for the Government of India, and Takeo Konishi, Country Director of ADB’s India Resident Mission signing for ADB.
The project is aimed at designing climate resilient urban infrastructure, strengthening institutional capacity and improving municipal resource mobilisation in 16 district headquarter towns (DHTs) in Nagaland, Ministry of Finance informed.
The facility would support key preparatory activities for the ensuing project aimed at improving urban infrastructure and services in Nagaland to help the state realise its economic potential, Mishra said after signing the agreement. He added that the Government of India is committed to the development of North-eastern region.
Konishi also said: “The ADB financing will ensure high readiness of the ensuing project through preparing an urban sector strategy, undertaking feasibility studies and detailed engineering designs of selected sub-projects and building capacity of state-level agencies in project implementation, resource mobilisation and anchoring reforms”.
The PRF loan will help design water supply, sanitation, solid waste management and urban roads in 16 DTHs with climate resilient features and improved access for the poor and vulnerable. Capacity building of state agencies will help augment own-resource mobilisation by urban local bodies (ULBs), improve their readiness for implementing the ensuing project and initiating sector and institutional reforms.