Botswana receives more aid from China
Boitshepo Majube | Monday April 7, 2014 11:52
Speaking at last week’s signing ceremony of a P71.5 million grant to Botswana, Zheng said China has provided many batches of economic and technical assistance to Botswana in the form of grants, interest free and concessional loans.
“As you may know, the assistance has been used to renovate and upgrade railways, to construct roads, to build residential houses and primary schools,” Zheng said, stressing that more concessional loans are available to Botswana.
He stated that through financing these projects they have contributed to the economic and social development of Botswana.
“China has always been willing to render support to the development of Botswana,” he said, adding that he hopes that the two countries will continue to work together in the future, and more Batswana would benefit from the cooperation between the two countries.
The Minister of Finance and Development Planning, Kenneth Matambo, said Botswana’s categorisation as a middle-income country has seen most of the development partners withdraw their assistance because they felt that their assistance was urgently needed elsewhere.
“However, a few partners, like the Chinese government have been supportive and assist us,” he said.
Matambo stated that the Chinese government has not only supported Botswana with financial grants, but also provided technical assistance, contributed to capacity building of Botswana government officials through different human resource development instruments.
Zheng said the P71.5 million will be used to improve Batswana’s livelihood. “Botswana can make specific project proposals to the Chinese embassy in areas such as agriculture, water resources, education, and environmental protection,” he said.
In 1997, the China Daily reported that since 1995 the Exim Bank had provided US $138 million in concessional loans to fund 15 projects in 10 countries.