The European Investment Bank (EIB), the European Union's long-term financing institution, is granting a new loan of ECU 65 million (1) to the Tunisian Republic for implementing various road improvement works designed to promote economic growth and to enhance the quality of urban life in Greater Tunis and nearby Soliman, as well as in the cities of Sfax and Sousse.
The works to be carried out in the country's capital, where 22% of Tunisia's population is concentrated, are an essential component of the Road Master Plan drawn up by the country's authorities to improve road safety and traffic flows in Greater Tunis. They comprise 6 sub-projects involving construction of three interchanges and widening of 18 km of radial roads and bypasses. The road improvement works in Sfax, Sousse and Soliman comprise construction or upgrading to dual carriageway of bypasses (51.6 km in all).
These schemes complement those already financed by the EIB, with loans totalling ECU 33 million, in 1994 and 1995, which centred on construction of two motorway interchanges at Ariana and Charguia, the building or upgrading to motorway standard of 13 km of radial roads and bypasses, installation of urban lighting, rehabilitation of 44 km of the GP7 radial road linking Tunis and Mateur and rehabilitation of around 11 km of the MC31 road between the Bardo quarter and Ben Ammar.
These improvements, to be undertaken between now and 2001 by the Ministry for Equipment's General Directorate for Roads and Bridges, will reduce bottlenecks and congestion, making for time savings through improved traffic flows, as well as having a beneficial effect on the environment by cutting vehicle exhaust emissions.
This loan, concluded under the Euro-Mediterranean Partnership facility, is the largest ever granted by the EIB in Tunisia.
The EIB is a lead player in implementing the European Union's "Euro-Mediterranean Partnership" and its priority objectives. In this context, a new mandate has been adopted for the period 1997-2000 to provide up to ECU 2 310 million of funding for projects in the twelve non-EU Mediterranean countries that have signed co-operation and/or association agreements with the EU. The Framework Contract governing the EIB's operations in Tunisia under this mandate was signed in July 1997. The EIB has already lent an aggregate of ECU 661.5 million in Tunisia over the past 19 years to finance various industrial, agricultural-processing, transport and environmental projects. Within this total, ECU 55.5 million drawn from the EU's budgetary resources has been advanced in the form of loans on special conditions and operations from risk capital resources.
(1) The conversion rates used by the EIB for statistical purposes during the current quarter are those obtaining on 30 September 1997, when ECU 1 = TND 1.24, GBP 0.69, IEP 0.76 and USD 1.113.