By Mohamed Arshi Daud, NNN-Bernama
Kuala Lumpur : The Islamic Development Bank (IDB) hopes to raise the remaining 7.4 billion USD of the Islamic Solidarity Fund for Development (ISFD) by the time the Dakar Islamic Summit takes place in the middle of next month.
“Hopefully, the whole 10 billion USD targeted for the fund can be mobilized during this period,” says the president of the Jeddah-based multilateral development financing institution, Dr Ahmed Mohamed Ali.
The ISFD, a poverty alleviation fund, was proposed during the Organizaion of the Islamic Conference (OIC) Third Extraordinary Summit in Mecca in December 2005.
The fund will concentrate on poverty alleviation projects in the least developed member countries (LDMC) of the IDB and pockets of poverty in other member countries.
Mohamed Ali said to date 2.6 billion USD had been raised following contributions from members countries like Saudi Arabia (two billion USD), Kuwait (300 million USD) Iran (100 million USD) and several other OIC countries.
He told Bernama in a recent interview that he hoped to see more contributions being announced at the next OIC Summit in the Senegalese capital of Dakar. “These include those by countries which have made initial contributions,” he added.
Mohamed Ali described the ISFD as a very important outcome of the summit in Mecca as 29 of IDB’s 56-member countries are classified as LDMC.
He disclosed that a board, set up by the IDB to manage the fund, had so far identified two projects — micro-financing with an indicated allocation of 500 million USD and vocational training, also with an allocation of 500 million USD.
“I hope these projects can start immediately,” he added. –