Afreximbank Supports Mali with $700m

The African Export-Import Bank (Afreximbank) will arrange $700 million multi-sourced finance to support trade and related infrastructure projects in Mali, focusing mainly on transport logistics, tourism, agro-processing and the financial sector, Dr. Benedict Oramah, President of the Bank, announced in Bamako recently. Oramah, who was speaking after a meeting with President Ibrahim Boubacar Keita of Mali, said the support would target activities aimed at increasing the country’s industrial capacity in cotton processing and at developing the transport and hotel infrastructure. “We have identified a number of projects to support Mali’s economic development,” Oramah added. Those included “the financing of an industrial park along the border with Burkina Faso and Côte d’Ivoire; the development of the country’s aviation sector; the construction of cross-border railway infrastructure; and financial support to the local banking industry”. “These key initiatives align with Afreximbank’s strategy to promote intra-African trade and the industrialisation of the continent,” he stated, adding that the Bank would deploy its Food Emergency Contingent Trade Financing Facility in the country to enable Mali mitigate and efficiently manage vulnerability to drought by substituting physical food reserves with readily available financing to import equivalent volumes of food in case of an emergency.