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n January of this year, the Asia Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB) officially opened for business. As the name implies, the bank was established to support infrastructure projects in Asia and has promised to be fully transparent to counter any critics. Countries are clambering to join the Beijingbased institution, which already has a capitalisation of £75 billion, and which allocated the first tranche of funds last month. Six months since its inauguration, the first meeting saw representatives from all 57 founding members come together to discuss ongoing projects and authorise the first £374 million in project loans, with Bangladesh, Indonesia, Pakistan, and Tajikistan receiving the first benefits of membership.
Bangladesh will be receiving a £125 million loan for the expansion of the country’s electricity grid. The project is expected to bring electricity to 12.5 million people, and is notable for being about electricity distribution rather than generation. Indonesia will be receiving £161 million for a World Bank co-financed slum development project, while Pakistan and Tajikistan received £74 million and £20 million respectively for highway and road projects. Apart from the Bangladesh
INDUSTRY NEWS
The first annual meeting of the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank was held in Beijing in June. Tom Pattinson looks at the results
产业内报
DEVELOPING NATIONS
which has led to a string of aspiring countries - many from Latin America - clambering to sign up. Brazil is the only Latin American shareholder, and Egypt and South Africa are only the two representatives from Africa. However Algeria, Chile, Colombia, Cyprus, Greece, Ireland, Libya, Nigeria, Senegal, Sudan, and Venezuela are all vying for membership. Lou Jiwei, AIIB chairman and Chinese finance minister, said that the bank would be accepting more
The project is notable for being about electricity distribution rather than generation project, all other ventures are jointloans with the World Bank, the Asian Development Bank, and the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, implying that the AIIB is making a cautious start. The comparatively small amount of funds allocated so far - around 5 percent also signals the world that they are looking strategically and sensibly at investment projects rather than spending too much, too soon. Only member countries can receive funding from the bank,
new members from Latin American countries very soon. “Given the increasingly close relationship between Asia and Latin America,” he said, “we will not be short of projects to finance.” Britain was one of the first to sign up, but America has so far refrained from joining. The bank is still in its soft launch phase with only 50 members of staff, but has plans to have over 100 staff by the end of the year, and to be fully operational with 500 staff by 2018. www.britishchamber.cn
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