ADB Approves Package Of Technical Assistance For Azerbaijan To Prepare For COP29 - Eugenue Zhukov (Exclusive Interview) (PHOTO)

(MENAFN- Trend News Agency) TBILISI, Georgia, May 6. The Asian DevelopmentBank (ADB) has approved the package of technical assistance forAzerbaijan to prepare for COP29, ADB Director General for Centraland Western Asia Eugenue Zhukov said in an exclusive interview withTrend on thesidelines of the ADB annual meeting in Tbilisi.

He pointed out that this is a special year for ADB andAzerbaijan, because this year marks 25 years since Azerbaijanjoined the Asian Development bank in 1999.

“Also, this year we're preparing our new country partnershipstrategy, which will cover the next five years from 2024 to 2028,and it will define the areas of collaboration between ADB and theRepublic of Azerbaijan. We're very excited that Azerbaijan has beenselected as the host for COP29, which will be held in Baku in earlyto mid-November this year. When this announcement was made inDecember of last year, ADB president sent congratulations note toPresident Ilham Aliyev, and offered ADB support to the governmentof Azerbaijan,” said Zhukov.

Zhukov recalled that three weeks ago or so, he had a chance tovisit Baku together with ADB climate change colleagues to discussspecific areas for possible collaboration in this area.

“We had an opportunity to discuss this with Azerbaijan'sMinister of Finance Samir Sharifov, who is the ADB governor, andhad a productive meeting with president-designate for COP29,Minister of Environment Mukhtar Babayev.
Since then, we've already approved a package of technicalassistance, which will help the country to build the capacity toconduct COP-related negotiations and to conduct the meeting itself is a kind of helping the country to prepare for COP. Ofcourse, we'll be happy to discuss any further areas forcollaboration,” added the ADB director general.

Supporting Azerbaijan's green agenda

“We're also helping the country to develop and implement moregreen energy projects, so to demonstrate to the world thatAzerbaijan is serious about climate change agenda. Two years ago,ADB invested in the largest solar power plant in the Caucasus. Thisis a 230-megawatt power plant run by Masdar company in Alat, whichI also had a chance to visit. It's a very modern plant, and it's astep towards fulfilling government's desire to implement a strategy30 by 2030, meaning that by that year, the country should be ableto produce 30 percent of its all energy from renewable sources,” hesaid.

Zhukov noted that ADB is discussing with Azerbaijan and alsowith the private sector further opportunities to invest in solarenergy projects.

“I hope that we will have more specific announcements for thislater this year. But also in general, we are discussing with thecountry possibilities of investment in the offshore wind powerprojects. And in addition, we are piloting a solar floating powerproject. That's when we put the panels on a lake or on any body ofwater and produce energy that way. We have a small 100 kW projectwhich is currently being implemented in one of the lakes in Baku'll see if this works, if we can work on it more,” he said.

Zhukov went on to add that ADB is also working with thegovernment of Azerbaijan to decarbonize the transport sector.

“For example, we have an ongoing project and we'll be providingadditional assistance to electrify parts of the North-South railwayproject. We'll be happy to work on additional scope of suchprojects in the future,” he said.

ADB director general noted that the Bank is a keen supporter ofregional cooperation, because it is probably one of the few MDBswhere the regional cooperation is mandated in its charterdocuments.

“In the case of Central Asia and Caucasus, in early 2000s weestablished Central Asia Regional Economic Cooperation Program(CAREC). Since that time, total investments in regionalcooperation, including connectivity, have exceeded $50 billion is of course ongoing study on the Black Sea cable, going fromAzerbaijan to Georgia, from Black Sea to Romania and the rest ofthe European Union. Feasibility study ongoing now. We hope that itis preliminary finished by mid or end of this year. So if the studydemonstrates that the project is feasible, we are very keen toparticipate in that. I think it is a very large project and if itis going to happen, I think there will be room for many IFIs toparticipate. Then if we look to the east, indeed we saw that a fewdays ago in Tashkent, the governments of Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan andAzerbaijan signed a preliminary MoU on the possible underwatercable crossing the Caspian Sea from Uzbekistan to Kazakhstan and toAzerbaijan on the so-called green energy corridor. Uzbekistan hasbeen investing quite a lot to produce renewable energy, solar andwind, in the western parts of the country, while most of theeconomic base is actually in east of Uzbekistan. We think thatthese projects have potential to produce green energy, which thencan be supplied for this proposed green corridor, but we believethat a lot of investments will be needed for this to happen,” hesaid.

Zhukov noted that since Azerbaijan joined ADB in 1999, the Bankprovided assistance package totaling $4.2 billion.

“But the biggest part of it for now is done for the publicsector. And our private sector window outstanding is only about $50million. It's an important lending. For example, the $21 millionproject we did two years ago, which we helped to develop230-megawatt solar power plant, is very good. But basically what wewould like to do, that in a country like Azerbaijan, which isupper-middle-income country, we see more scope for direct privatesector investments from ADB with other partners, but withoutgovernment guarantee, meaning that we will not be adding to thegovernment debt. The other aspects of this is that many people callthis COP29 the finance COP. So we're very keen to work with thegovernment and other IFIs to work on more innovative modalities tohelp address the issues related to climate change, which willrequire quite substantive investments,” he said.

Details of New Country Strategy

“We are preparing the New Country Partnership Strategy. But Ihave to say that the overwhelming agenda for this strategy would bedealing with the consequences of climate change and helpingAzerbaijan to decarbonize its economy and to increase the share ofrenewable energy. So, no matter what sectors that we work in, thisis an overarching agenda for ADB, not only in Azerbaijan, but inall of Asia and Pacific. Overall, ADB committed to invest $100billion by the year 2030 in this agenda,” he said.

Transport sector

“But if you look in sectors, we also want to work more ontransportation, continue expanding our cooperation with theAzerbaijan Railways, because there is a lot of unfinished agendathere to rehabilitate and rectify the whole network,” saidZhukov.

He pointed out that ADB also looks forward to successfulnegotiations between Azerbaijan and Armenia, because once the peaceagreement is reached, that would allow the country to unlockadditional transportation corridor, connect Azerbaijan and theregion better to the world.

“There is quite an old railway which runs from the southern partof Azerbaijan through Armenia to Nakhchivan. So, if peace agreementis reached and other agreements are in place, we will be veryexcited to invest in rehabilitating that network, but of coursesubject to government of Azerbaijan's priority resolutions,” headded.

Cooperation in education

“Another area which we will work on is education. For a while,we've been discussing with the government the possibility ofimproving technical education in Azerbaijan, because you need toskill up your young workforce for the remainder of the 21stcentury. We hope to provide investment in this area. The earlier,the better. And in general, as I highlighted earlier, we'llprobably be looking at shifting our focus a bit more in balancingbetween public sector investments and the private sectorinvestments,” he concluded.

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