Announcement of World Bank and IDA Approve 610.5 Million Dollars in Loans to Seven Countries India Receives Largest Loan Ever Made on December 11, 1980

. '' JOR IMMEDIATE . RELEASE . . . ~ 10 8:) ~t~~'.~ tWorldBank 1818 H Street, N.W ., Washington, D.C. 20433, U.S.A.• Telephone: (202) 477-1234 SUMMARY NEWS RELEASE December 11, 1980 WORLD BANK AND lDA APPROVE $610.5 MILLION IN LOANS TO SEVEN COUNTRIES lNDIA RECEIVES LARGEST LOAN EVER MADE BY WORLD BANK The World Bank and its affiliate for concessionary lending, the International Development Association (IDA), have approved Joans amounting to $610.5 million to Argentina, Chile, Egypt, India, Mauritius, Sri Lanka, and Western Samoa. A $400 million loan, the largest ever made by the World Bank, goes to India for an energy project. The loan will help finance the development of the Bombay High oil and gas field, some 200 kilometers off the west coast of India. India will also receive a credit of SOR 63.3 million ($83 million) to supp0it an irrigation project in Orissa state. The project will help ensure continued avail- ability of irrigation water in a command area of some 167,000 hectares. Argentina will receive a $10 million World Bank loan for exploring coal • reserves in the Austral Basin in Santa Cruz province • In Chile, some 250 kilometers of the Longitudinal Highway, a part of which forms the Pan American Highway, will be reconstructed with a $42 million loan from the World Bank. Egypt will use a $25 million World Bank loan to help finance a petroleum explo- ration project in the Western Desert. The project will cover a 2,000 square kilometer area adjoining the Abu Gharadig gas fields. Mauritius will use a $15 million World Bank Joan to rehabilitate housing and urban services in poor areas damaged by cyclones and to provide sites and services at La Tour Koenig, a suburb of the capital city of Port Louis. In Sri Lanka, an IDA credit amounting to SOR 25.6 million ($33.5 million) will go to a rural development project designed to help improve the production of paddy and coconut in Puttalam and Matale districts. Western Samoa will receive an IDA credit of SOR 1.6 million ($2 million) as co-financing for an agricultural development project to be carried out with funds from the Asian Development Bank and the Australian Development Assistance Bureau. NOTE: IDA credits are denominated in SDRs (Special Drawing Rights), which are valued on the basis of a "basket" of currencies. The U.S. dollar equivalent • of the SOR amount of the IDA credit reflects the exchange rates existing at the time of negotiation of the credit .