Jordan signs 107.5m euro agreement with Germany

AMMAN – Jordan and Germany on Monday signed several agreements for grants and soft loans to support development projects in the Kingdom. 

With the German support totalling 107.5 million euros, Minister of Planning and International Cooperation Imad Fakhoury noted that 83.5 million euros are earmarked as grants, while around 24 million euros will be provided as soft loans to support a number of development schemes. 

Noting that the new agreements are part of Germany’s support to the Jordan Response Plan and a follow up on its London Conference commitments, Fakhoury expressed Jordan’s gratitude to the government and people of Germany for their “continuous and generous support to the Kingdom to assist it in its development efforts and to help address some of the challenges arising from the influx of Syrian refugees”.

“We strongly value the commitment and pledges made by Germany as the co-host of the London and Brussels conferences. We are grateful for the way they translated their pledges into actual commitments on the ground,” the minister said. 

He also voiced appreciation for Germany’s additional support to Jordan as a result of the Brussels Conference. 

About 191.3 million euros were announced as additional support to Jordan’s Executive Development Programme, the Jordan Response Plan and other development priorities, including 150 million euros to support the water sector in cooperation with the the KfW, the German government-owned development bank, according to the minister. 

“With this support, the German commitment to Jordan has reached 282.66 million euros so far in 2017,” Fakhoury highlighted. 

At the signing ceremony, attended by the ministers of water, education and public works, Germany’s Ambassador to Jordan, Birgitta Maria Siefker-Eberle, noted that the new batch of agreements “sends a strong signal of the long-lasting and strong cooperation between the two countries”. 

“The new commitment, which brings up the support to 282.66 million euros this year, reflects our recognition of the enormous efforts undertaken by Jordan and our confidence in the ability of the government of Jordan to deliver on these projects,” Siefker-Eberle said.

She noted that the new commitments for 2017 includes 191.26 million euros to finance projects in the water sector, vocational training, climate and employment promotion and support of Small and Medium Enterprises.

“The new support includes the first German Development Policy loan ever delivered to Jordan. The government has been asking for this support for a long time…,” the ambassador added. 

The ceremony also saw the signing of several contracts between the KfW and Jordan on new financial cooperation projects for school construction, teachers’ salaries, water and wastewater systems and energy efficiency in the water sector.   

Germany’s development commitment towards Jordan in 2016 stood at 322.5 million euros, according to Siefker-Eberle. 

The ministers underlined the significance of the new support in assisting development plans in their respective fields.