The Association of Banks in Jordan held a meeting for the banking sector representatives along with the presence of the Ministry of Water and Irrigation. The meeting aimed at presenting a summary of the National Carrier Project and discussing the proposed mechanisms for the sector’s participation in financing the project.

The National Carrier Project is greatly important as it will contribute to covering Jordan’s water needs until 2040 by pumping and desalinating water from Aqaba. The project will pump approximately 300 million cubic meters of desalinated water annually to the capital Amman and the rest of governorates. In fact, it is considered one of the largest local projects to be currently undertaken by the Ministry of Water and Irrigation.

Dr. Maher Al-Mahrouq, Director-General of the Association, pointed out in a welcoming speech to the project’s strategic importance in addition to stressing the need to inform banks of the project’s details to establish partnership in developing financing tools either directly or through financing the executing through various bids.

The Director General of the National Carrier Project Unit and Advisor to the Minister of Water and Irrigation, Eng. Grace Dababneh, gave a general summary of the project that included its technical and financing aspects. He also thanked the United States Agency for International Cooperation (USAID) for its permanent cooperation with the Ministry in terms of financing the project’s studies and preparing its main documents. Dababneh noted to the European Investment Bank role in financing and sponsoring the project’s environmental study.

The attendees discussed the project’s technical and financial aspects, and they listened to a specialized technical presentation done by the consulting company expert in which he outlined the project’s elements, phases, lifespan, and financial map. The ministry’s competent team and the consulting company answered all the technical and financial questions raised by the attendees.

The Association of Banks had held a previous meeting on the project in the presence of His Excellency the Minister of Water with the aim of introducing the banking sector to the ministry’s water projects and discussing the financing solutions that banks may contribute to in light of durability indicators and local bank’s ability to finance major capital projects within the framework of public-private partnerships.