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MCDF GRANT TO SUPPORT DEVELOPMENT BANK OF KAZAKHSTAN’S GREEN AND CROSS-BORDER INFRASTRUCTURE FINANCING PREPARATION

Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, 17 December 2024

A USD840,000 grant that seeks to help the Development Bank of Kazakhstan (DBK) prepare green and cross-border infrastructure financing was approved by the Multilateral Cooperation Center for Development Finance (MCDF) Governing Committee during its meeting in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia on 17 December. The project will be implemented by the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB).

The MCDF grant will fund activities to assist DBK in enhancing and implementing its environmental and social management system (ESMS). The enhanced ESMS will apply to a non-sovereign backed on lending facility of up to USD100 million provided by AIIB.

The objective is to build DBK’s institutional capacity to conduct environmental and social (E&S) due diligence that complies with standards required for financing by AIIB and other International Financial Institutions (IFIs).

This will support the green and cross-border connectivity infrastructure subprojects of DBK to be financed by the on-lending facility. These subprojects are expected to cover the renewable energy and transport and logistics sectors.

The MCDF grant will support efforts to enhance and implement revised policies and procedures at DBK to meet IFIs’ E&S standards, as well as provide second party opinion to certify the alignment of subprojects with DBK’s Green Bond Framework.

The grant will also support work to apply E&S standards to the on-lending facility’s subprojects, covering E&S due diligence, monitoring, and reporting, and offer capacity building to sub-borrowers on measuring greenhouse gas emissions.

DBK aims to expand the application of its enhanced ESMS to future investments. It would also offer lessons and experience for promoting E&S standards among other financial institutions in Kazakhstan.

To this end, the MCDF grant will additionally support a series of training and knowledge-sharing events and a comprehensive study on environmental and climate co-benefits and their impact on selected DBK-financed projects that provides guidance on future investments.

Contact
David Hendrickson
Senior Communications Officer
Mobile: +86 185 0114 6758
david.hendrickson@themcdf.org