This is the last
meeting between EVNNPT and Asian Development Bank (ADB) – one of EVNNPT’s
main donors. The meeting was chaired by EVNNPT’s Chairman of Management
Board, held in EVNNPT headquarters. Participation in the meeting, EVNNPT
includes Mr. Nguyen Minh Thang – Member of Management Board, Mr. Vu Tran Nguyen
– Vice President and representatives of functional Departments; ADB includes Mr.
Anthony Jude – Senior consultant of Director of SouthEast Asia Department, Mr.
Jim Liston – Energy Specialist of SouthEast Asia Department and project officers
of ADB office in Hanoi.
EVNNPT
has a meeting with ADB
As a head of ADB mission – Mr. Anthony
Jude revealed that he is very happy to have chance, in a new position, to work
with EVNNPT after moving to a new section 2 years ago.
At the meeting, Chairman Dang Phan
Tuong and Mr. Anthony and ADB project officers have discussed issues on
investment plan, investment cost demand of EVNNPT in period 2016 – 2020 and
consequent years as well as possibilities of ADB in supplying fund to EVNNPT.
Based on the investment cost demand
of USD 700 million to USD 900 million/year from 2016 onward, of which up to 60%
required to be mobilized from international sources including ODA. The 2 sides
have agreed that ADB will continue support and accompany EVNNPT in development
of national transmission grid, under the more opened policies and lending
manner, which facilitate EVNNPT to reach the development target in long-term
and become a strong and professional transmission services provider in the
region and Asia.
It can be confirmed that the
itinerary on finding solution for EVNNPT’s fund arrangement chaired by Mr. Dang
Phan Tuong in working with the traditional and new donors (AFD, KfW, ADB, BNP
Paribas...) has gained good results, concretely:
1. The main donors: ADB and KfW
have committed to finance the projects connected to power plants instead of
denying financing consideration as they did before, under requirements on
consideration of compliance with ADB’s social and environment regulations
applied for EVNNPT and power plants.
2. AfD: AfD revealed that it will
consider financing installation works of projects proposed by EVNNPT instead of
financing only goods contracts as applied so far.
3. ADB, KfW and AfD have committed
to provide the non-refundable assistance in order to strengthen capacity
building on technical, financial and management aspects for EVNNPT.
4. ADB informed that it will add a
new lending type namely Results Based Lending –RBL. This type of loan can be
deployed right in 2015, with opened and favourable criteria:(i) The proposed
projects do not belong to Group A on environment as regulated by ADB, but
belong to Group B, C; (ii) National Competitive Bidding (NCB) or International
Competitive Bidding (ICB) can be applied; (iii) Bidding documents must be
complied with ADB templates; (iv) Bidding documents can be implemented by
EVNNPT itself in accordance with Law on Procurement of Vietnam; (v) Regulations
on compliance with social, environment issues will be Vietnam-based; (vi) ADB will
consider and agree in advance with EVNNPT the procurement plan. However, the
loan will be more tied in regard of disbursement compared with that of
traditional loans. The disbursement will be based on results of implementing
indicators agreed and indicated in the Loan Agreement. Firstly, from 2017 –
2019, ADB will finance EVNNPT about USD 600 million divided into 2 RBL loans.
5. ADB may consider financing
EVNNPT with USD 1.2 billion for 2016 –
2025 period, in which EVNNPT will provide general investment demand together
with carry out tranche 3 and 4 of Multi Finance Facility (MFF).
6. AfD revealed that it may provide
EVNNPT with the direct loan, without guarantee by the Government within 2
coming years, on the basic of pilot results carried out with EVN and results
gained in the Technical Assistance of EUR 500,000 provided to EVNNPT.
7. BNP Paribas: Agree to reduce
0.05% of margin interest rate from 1.45%
to 1.4%; in future, it may consider to further reduce margin interest rate.
8. Together with the fund
arrangement, EVNNPT mission had a meeting with RTE (Power Transmission
Corporation of France). The mission had chance to understand its organization
and experiences on management, operation of transmission system, application of
new technologies in order to build an integrated and modern transmission grid
of Vietnam which can ensure a reliable, secure and flexible operation, reaching
a target on becoming a leading power transmission services provider in Asia.
RTE is one of leading organization on live-work in Europe. It has many
experiences on live work practice and training for Power Corporations of
various countries such as: Great Britain, Australia, Norwea, Turkey, Malaysia,
Algeria, etc. RTE expressed its willing in sharing information, data with
EVNNPT, supporting in solving technical difficulties, power system operation,
providing services, training on live-work as well as participating in
international competitive bidding to provide services to EVNNPT.
Satisfying with the gained results,
committing to make high efforts to create a future closer cooperation in order
to get a highest effectiveness in mutual cooperation can be considered as
general determination by EVNNPT and partners in the last mission./.