Chairman of the Management Board at the Eurasian Development Bank (EDB) Nikolai Podguzov revealed plans to cooperate with GCC countries, including Saudi Arabia, to develop energy infrastructure.
Podguzov told Asharq Al-Awsat that the bank, which is the international financial organization that operates in Central Asia and in Eurasia, works on implementing a working plan based on three strategies.
“Every year we execute around 30-40 new projects and set up agreements,” he said.
“The investments of the bank are growing at least 20% each year,” Podguzov revealed. “We are quite a fast developing bank. Uzbekistan has just joined the bank this year.”
Regarding the size of loans and investments handled by EDB, Podguzov explained that the bank’s average investment ranges between $100 million and $400 million. He added however, that the bank is capable of syndicating larger loans that can reach up to $1 billion or more, while the average annual investment volume is around $2.53 billion.
Regarding the bank’s work plans for the coming year, Podguzov explained that the Eurasian Development Bank is simultaneously working to strengthen its relations with the GCC countries and the Islamic Development Bank.
“We improve connectivity, transport infrastructure and logistics. We improve access to water for regions in Central Asia. We develop energy infrastructure in our member states,” he told Asharq Al-Awsat.
“We take care of food safety and food safety infrastructure, which provides access to food and provides food security for our member states. And I think in this field we can set up very good economic ties and cooperation between GCC countries and Central Asia.”
“I know that such countries like Saudi Arabia, Emirates, Oman are quite interested in the topics of our strategy,” he said.
“We mainly do non-sovereign finance … which is very convenient for our potential partners,” he added.
Podguzov said there is a partnership with Masdar which “is a world leader in bringing renewable energy technologies into the world. They are quite active in Central Asia, in Kazakhstan in particular.”
“That is why, for example, we are very much interested in cooperation with Masdar company. This is one of examples. I think logistics and logistics project also could be of interest for Saudi Arabia. A lot of infrastructure could be developed together with the help of Eurasian Development Bank.”
“I believe that it’s also very important to build economic bridge between GCC countries and Central Asia. And I think the bank can do a lot in this field and finally we can bring together economic interests of Central Asian and GCC countries.”
