BRICS' New Development Bank has 23 projects in pipeline, including 6 in India: K V Kamath

BEIJING: The BRICS' New Development Bank has 23 new projects amounting to $six billion in the pipeline for financing, including six ventures in India valued at $1.8 billion, the bank's President K V Kamath said today.

The bank set up by Brazil, Russia, India has seen good results in the last two years and has a strong pipeline for the future, Kamath told the media at the bank's headquarters in Shanghai on the occasion of completing two years of its founding.

The bank has 23 projects at various stages of preparation for 2017 to 2018, with a total lending amount of $six billion, Kamath told reporters, including Indian journalists based in Beijing who were linked up online to the press meet.

"The last two years have been very satisfying to us. It has built a strong foundation for the bank," he said.

Among the projects in the pipeline six are in India totalling up to $1.8 billion. The financing in India is aimed at improving rural infrastructure development, he said.

The projects in the pipeline also include five projects, totalling $1.7 billion, in China. The remainder projects are -- seven in Brazil, two in Russia, and three in South Africa.

In 2016, the bank granted $1.5 billion in loans to seven projects. Most projects involved green energy or infrastructure, Kamath said.

The bank sold its first three billion yuan ($437 million) yuan-denominated bonds in China in July last year, to fund clean energy projects in member states.

It plans to issue rupee-denominated bonds this year and will also look for opportunities to issue bonds in Brazil and Russia, Kamath said.

The bank currently has 100 staff members which are expected to be increased to 150 by the end of the year, he said

The bank formally opened on July 21, 2015. The NDB was established with an initial fund of $100 billion pooled from five BRICS countries. Kamath is its first President of the bank.