Presently the World Bank is playing a crucial role in providing loan to developing countries for the development projects. The World Bank provides loans for various projects ranging from poverty alleviation to infrastructural development for the long term period of 5 to 20 years.
The World Bank Group has 189 member countries, staff from more 170 countries and offices in over 130 locations.
As per the information available on the website of the World Bank, IBRD is funding 13,229 projects in 173 countries of the world. India is not behind in this race and more than 783 projects of India are funded by the World Bank.
The World Bank Group composes of the 5 institutions i.e. IBRD, IFC, IDA, MIGA and ICSID. International development organisation (IDA) is the associate association of the World Bank's, known as the soft loan window. It provides loans to poor countries at very low rate of interest.
List of all the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)
How much loan is given by the World Bank?
The lending terms are determined with reference to recipient countries. World Bank decides the loan to a country on the basis of 3 criterion;
1. Risk of debt distress
2. The level of GNI Per Capita
3. Creditworthiness for the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development (IBRD) borrowing.
A recipient with a high risk of debt distress receives 100% of their financial assistance in the form of grants and those with a medium risk of debt distress receive 50% in the form of grants. Other recipients receive IDA credits on regular or blend and hard-terms with 38-year and 25-year maturities respectively.
What are the eligibility criteria for IDA loan?
Eligibility for IDA loan depends first and foremost on a country’s relative poverty, defined as GNI per capita below an established threshold and updated annually ($1,165 in fiscal year 2018). As of now 75 countries are currently eligible to receive IDA resources.
Some countries such as Nigeria and Pakistan are eligible for IDA loan based on Per Capita Income levels and are also creditworthy for some IBRD borrowing. They are referred to as “Blend” Countries.
Rate of interest charged for different countries are as follows;
List of top 10 IDA loan borrowers in 2017 is as follows;
Recently the World Bank has released the list of largest borrowers from the World Bank Group. This list shows that China, India and Indonesia are the top three borrowers from the World Bank Group in the FY 2017.
