Spain offers first ODA for PH
The Spanish government is offering the Philippines its first concessional loans to help the country in funding its infrastructure projects, the Department of Finance (DOF) said.
In a recent roundtable discussion at the DOF headquarters, Finance Assistant Secretary Maria Edita Z. Tan, said that the government received a $300 million offer of official development assurance (ODA) from Kingdom of Spain.
Tan said the DOF is now crafting the memorandum of understanding to seal the three-year financing package between the governments of Spain and the Philippines.
According the Tan, the Spanish ODA has “very good” terms, citing “for the euro it’s 0.25 percent over a 35-year period inclusive of a 10 year grace period while the dollar facility is 1.15 percent over a 20 year period inclusive of a 10year grace period.”
The loans could finance infrastructure projects related to energy, telecommunications, water treatment, solid waste, food industry and tourism, Tan disclosed.
“We started discussing with them late last year, [and] I think within the next two months,” the agreement will be signed, the finance official said. “Actually we just discovered this facility, previously we’ve never tapped this facility.”
“This one is like the first ODA, pure ODA. I think there have been some grants in the past but this one is purely ODA,” Tan said.
Finance Secretary Carlos G. Dominguez III, meanwhile, expressed his thanks to the Spanish government for the ODA offer.
“You know we have to thank the former ambassador, he’s the one who worked on that,” Dominguez said, referring to Spanish former Ambassador to Manila Luis Antonio Calvo Castaño.
Earlier, the finance department said that Spanish companies were interested to invest in the government’s railway projects, while the Philippine government and the Kingdom of Spain may seal their economic and financial cooperation agreement in “various fields.”
The Philippines and Spain were aiming to explore cooperation in agriculture, industry, energy and services, water infrastructure, climate finance, environmental economics and disaster risk finance.