Jordan receives JD1.2b foreign aid in 11 months

AMMAN – The Ministry of Planning and International Cooperation on Sunday said the overall amount of foreign assistance, grants and soft loans committed to Jordan by international donors reached $1.74 billion (JD1.2 billion) by the end of November. 

According to a ministry statement, grants amounted to $1.079 billion, while contracted low cost loans were worth $663 million. 

Except for aid directed to support the state budget, the disbursement of the committed assistance is based on the time frame to implement projects, which usually ranges between two to five years, said the ministry. 

The ministry issued a list of 14 donor countries and international and Arab organisations that extended financial assistance to the Kingdom in the form of long-term and cheap loans and grants. 

The US, through USAID, has so far this year extended aid worth $633 million as grants. 

The US was followed by the European Union, according to the ministry, which indicated that out of the $298 million made available to Jordan, a total of $224 million came in soft loans while $74 million was extended as grants. 

The World Bank financed Jordan with $253, $250 million as loans while the remaining $3 million was a grant. 

The Saudi Development Fund donated $232 million to Jordan, all of which was in the form of grants as the agency was extending part of Saudi Arabia’s share in the Gulf Cooperation Council’s (GCC) grant to Jordan. 

During a GCC summit in December 2011, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Kuwait and Qatar decided to extend $5 billion in financial aid to development schemes in Jordan over a five-year period, with each state contributing $1.25 billion.

Japan was the fifth largest donor to Jordan with $178 million, $60 million as grants and $118 million in soft loans, followed by Germany with $84 million, $22 million of which was a grant. 

On the overall volume of financial assistance Jordan is projected to receive by the end of this year, a ministry official told The Jordan Times that it is not clear yet as the Kingdom is set to sign grant and loan agreements with donors before the end of the month. 

Saudi Arabia and the EU are among the donors the government is expected to sign agreements with in the coming few weeks, said the official, without elaborating. 

In the draft 2015 budget law, the government is projecting to receive JD1.12 billion (around $1.6 billion) as grants. 

Prime Minister Abdullah Ensour has recently told editors that grants included in the draft law were only those the government is “100 per cent certain it would receive by the end of next year”.