The federal government and the World Bank power sector team met on the possibility of Nigeria accessing a one billion dollar Performance Based Loan (PBL) from multilateral institutions.
Finance Minister Mrs Zainab Ahmed dropped the hint at a joint news conference with Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) Governor Godwin Emefiele at the end of the 2019 World Bank/International Monetary Fund (IMF) spring meetings in the United States.
She spoke of plans by the Debt Management Office (DMO) to issue N15 billion green bond to fund agriculture, power, health and water amenities to make life better for the people, saying the green bond will be the second one and would be used to finance agriculture, power sector – mostly solar projects, as well as some projects in the water sector.
She pointed out that the projects for which the funds will be applied must be green.
On fuel subsidy, Mrs Ahmed said there was no plan by the government to remove fossil fuel subsidies as the federal government believes doing so will increase the burden of the poor.
The International Monetary Fund (IMF) has been advocating the removal of fuel subsidy to free more money for infrastructural development.