KFAED signs agreement worth KD 5 million with Sierra Leone

Bid to bankroll water improvement project

KUWAIT CITY, Nov 18, (KUNA): Kuwait Fund For Arab Economic Development (KFAED) Sunday signed a deal worth KD five million (around $17 million) with Sierra Leone to bankroll a water environment improvement project in Freetown.

Another agreement was hammered out by the fund and Sierra Leone’s Guma Valley Water Company (GVWC) for the management of the project, the KFAED said in a statement.

Serving nearly 5.9 million people, the project aims at revamping water and sanitation services in Greater Freetown Area as part of efforts to achieve ecological sustainable development and tap natural resources in an efficient mode, it added.

It is the 10th loan provided by the Kuwaiti fund to Sierra Leone as it has already offered it nine loans valued at a total of KD 32.7 million ($111 million), along with technical aid in the vicinity of KD 449,000 (roughly $1.5 million), according to the statement.

Both deals were signed by Deputy Director General for Operations of Kuwait Fund for Arab Economic Development Marwan Al-Ghanim and Sierra Leone’s Minister of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation Nabeela Tunis.

Attended at the signing ceremony were Deputy Prime Minister, Foreign Minister and KFAED Board Chairman Sheikh Sabah Khaled Al-Hamad Al-Sabah, Deputy Foreign Minister Khaled Al-Jarallah and Assistant Foreign Minister for Protocols Ambassador Dhari Al-Ajran.

Cooperation between KFAED and Sierra Leone started in 1989 during the signing of the first agreement to finance the Waterloo-Kent road.

The cooperation mainly embraces transport and health sectors.