Energy sector reform is needed

Caspian Energy (CE) Mr. Zhang, this year the ADB is celebrating its 50th anniversary. How did the Bank's loan portfolio change over this period of time? Which sectors of global economy enjoyed prioritized funding on a stable basis?

Wencai Zhang, Vice-President (Operations 1) of the Asian Development Bank (ADB):  Established in 1966, ADB’s original focus was on the agriculture sector, and how we could help avoid starvation amid the growing population. Since then, we have expanded our operations to infrastructure such as transport, energy, and water. And now, we are focusing more on climate change and gender. Asia has made serious progress on poverty reduction and economic development over the past 50 years. It is a much more prosperous place, and many people are now enjoying a better life. ADB has played an important role by helping countries develop through investment and support for infrastructure, social services like health and education, and by providing training and capacity building. But there are still many challenges. In Asia and the Pacific, 330 million people still live on less than $1.90 a day.

At the beginning of our activity, with only 31 member countries, we approved a few projects amounted to a few hundred million dollars per year. Today we have 67 member countries including Azerbaijan, which joined the shareholders of the Bank in 1999, and we approved more than 100 projects amounted to over $16 billion in 2015. We will further scale up our annual lending level starting from 2017. Our portfolio is quite diverse with 80% of the projects in energy, transport, urban, and finance sectors. We also finance social sector projects and in 2015 the share of education projects in our portfolio was recorded at 5.8%.