Ethiopia, Danish Bank sign €8.8m loan agreement for PIF project

Addis Ababa, December 11, 2020 (FBC) –The Ministry of Finance and the Danish Bank, Danske Bank A/S, have signed a loan agreement amounting to €8.81 million for the implementation of the public sector investment facility (PIF) project in Ethiopia.

The loan agreement for the project entitled “Meteorological observation infrastructure and forecasting capabilities of the National Meteorological Agency (NMA)” was singed today via a virtual ceremony.

The agreement was signed by Ahmed Shide, Ethiopia’s Minister of Finance and Jelsper B. Petterson, Director of Danske Bank A/S and Helen Taylor, Associate Director of the bank.

As per the PIF project proposal, the estimated overall project investment cost is €13 million, of which the Danske Bank A/S is committed to cover the commercial contract amounting to €8.23 million.

The remaining outstanding amounting to €4.77 million will be covered by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Finland, according to a press release issued by the Ministry of Finance.

The project aims to provide access to efficient early‐warning services with more accurate forecasts and longer lead‐ times by upgrading existing Ethiopia’s hydro-meteorological observation network with weather radar and lightning detection network and strengthening the existing operations by employing centralized data collection for all observations and updating existing weather radar with sustainable solar power supply.

An essential part of the project is improving the capability of forecasting and service production of the Ethiopia meteorological system with the expertise of the Finnish Meteorological Institute.