WB announces priorities on Karabakh

The World Bank is about to start the preparation of a new partnership document on cooperation with Azerbaijan and will soon begin discussions with the Azerbaijani government, the World Bank Country Manager for Azerbaijan, Sarah Michael, told Report.

According to Michael, it is very much based on Azerbaijan 2030 Vision, and the Bank builds this new strategy in line with the government's priorities:

"We are to start the process of developing our new country partnership framework in the next several months, which will be the five-year plan for the World Bank in Azerbaijan and our partnership. So in the next few months, we'll be listening to the government to see which priorities they want us to focus on, both in terms of investments and knowledge-sharing and capacity-building.

"We realize there are so many different priorities in the country, such as building human capital, supporting the private sector, recovery and reconstruction in Karabakh, or clean energy. So, we'll have to see which areas the Government wants us to focus on."

While commenting on the World Bank's support for the liberated territories of Azerbaijan, she said:

"Right now, we doing some research, it's still very early days. We'll be glad to support the government, as they request us to support reconstruction and recovery in Karabakh. We think there is a tremendous opportunity both for the integration of the area into national systems, but also to grow regional trade and regional connectivity. So, we'll be very glad to work with the government on that.

"We have other project ideas, but we have to wait until the government tells us which one they want us to work on. We worked very much on the water in the past, and now we are discussing some issues in the field of water security. We are also working on employment support and jobs training, we are working on connectivity and secondary road networks, and we also do a lot of work on a wide range of things from supporting the digitalization of the healthcare system to road safety, to green energy, to smart villages, the inclusion of disabled people, and we'll continue throughout this year and next several years."