CAF and AFD will strengthen health systems of Latin America and the Caribbean with the financing of EUR 100 million

CAF -Development Bank of Latin America- and the Agence française de développement (AFD) signed a new credit facility to mobilize resources from France for EUR 100 million towards the region's health sector. These funds are added to the existing cooperation between both organizations, through which CAF has mobilized around USD 780 million from AFD.

These new funds will promote vaccination programs, epidemiological surveillance, telehealth, recovery of essential services, strengthening of health systems, among others. The funds are part of CAF's strategy to attract resources to address the health emergency caused by Covid-19, within the framework of a USD 1,000 million credit line that the institution approved during 2021 to support and strengthen the health systems of the countries of the region.

Gloria Gamero, Director of Institutional Financial Resources of CAF, and Nicolas Fornage, Regional Director of the Andean Countries of AFD, were present at the signing of the agreement.

“With this agreement we reinforce our alliance with the AFD and reiterate our commitment to mobilizing international resources to finance the great development challenges of the region, such as the improvement of health systems, economic reactivation, green growth, and digitization,” said Sergio Díaz-Granados, Executive President of CAF.

Nicolas Fornage said that "With this financing provided by the French government, through AFD, to CAF's regional contingent credit line, France actively participates in the support for access to vaccination against Covid-19 in Latin America. The French funds will make it possible to accompany several States in this region to face the pandemic, in complementarity with the COVAX multilateral mechanism, and thus foster the conditions for an economic recovery, of the utmost importance for these countries”.

Among the achievements of the collaboration between CAF and AFD are the co-financing of USD 760 million and technical assistance resources for approximately EUR 9 million. The joint work to promote sustainable development in the region has benefited large-scale projects in Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Colombia, Ecuador and Mexico.