ANKARA - The government tries to get the World Bank loans that it could not receive ready for use.
Sources said on Tuesday that State Minister Ali Babacan had had a meeting with World Bank Turkey Director Ajay Chhibber yesterday.
They had discussed release of loan facilities in near future like the Second Public and Finance Sector Adjustment Loan (PFPSAL-II) and Economic Reform Loan, particularly the Country Assistance Strategy (CAS) that is planned to be put into effect in June or July, sources said.
Sources said that Ajay Chhibber would have meetings today with the government and economic officials.
A World Bank delegation held contacts in Turkey last week on realizations that will allow approval of loan tranches of 900 million U.S. dollars in total under PFPSAL-II.
Turkey has not yet taken the second and third tranches of 1 billion 350 million U.S. dollars of PFPSAL-II as it could not provide necessary conditions. The bank lent first tranche of 450 million U.S. dollars in August 2002.
Meanwhile, 375 million U.S. dollars of second tranche of the 760 million U.S. dollars of the Economic Reform Loan (ERL) is expected to be approved by the end of March or in April.
Meanwhile, Turkey is expected to receive 100 million U.S. dollars second tranche of the program part of the Agriculture Reform Implementation Project (ARIP) in the first half of the year.
Sources said that also the International Monetary Fund (IMF) was seeking same conditions as the World Bank and that approval of the ''Fourth Review'' by the IMF Board would be an important criterion for release of those loan tranches by the World Bank.
(MS-AÖ) 04.03.2003