During his participation in the meetings of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) in Washington, Dr Ashraf Al Araby, Egyptian Minister of Planning and International Cooperation, has signed two loans worth $ 65 million, submitted by the OPEC Fund for International Development (OFID) in order to contribute to financing two ventures for both ministries of agriculture and water resources. Al Araby, in a statement released this morning, emphasized that the first venture aims to develop the field irrigation as well as to enhance sustainable administration of the water resources in the area of the venture. This will lead to improving the agricultural production. The project will be financed by $ 35 million. The second loan, which is $ 30 million, would be spent on renewing the irrigation pumping stations, besides eliminating the poverty through improving the quality of water; leading to boosting the production as well as the income in the poor governorates, like Al Behaira, Kafr Al Sheikh, Al Dakahlya and Sharqua. The Egyptian minister also witnessed signing agreement between the OPEC Fund for International Development (OFID) and the Islamic Development Bank (IDB), the World Bank, and the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) in order to launch the first phase of the "Arab Development Portal". The Arab Development Portal aims to document and disseminate the economic information that relate to the issues of development in the Arab countries. Both of Egypt and Tunisia were chosen as leading examples during launching the first phase of the portal.
