A recently published report of the World Bank revealed that the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) represents the lowest of all the World Bank's lending commitments.
The MENA region represents just seven per cent of overall lending commitments of the bank, which reached $23.6 billion in the just-ended fiscal year, reflecting a six per cent rise as compared to the previous year, said the report according to Gulf News. Lending commitments to the MENA region from the bank, on the other hand, reached $1.7 billion.
"Africa had 20 per cent of total lending commitments with $4.8 billion. Europe and Central Asia had 17 per cent with $4 billion; South Asia 16 per cent with $3.8 billion; East Asia and the Pacific had 14 per cent with $3.4 billion, while the Mena had seven per cent with $1.7 billion," the report stated.
The report also revealed that the lion's share of the lending commitments in the past financial year were mainly for investment operations, while the rest was predominantly for policy based operations.
"A total of $16.3 billion was for investment while 31 per cent, or $7.3 billion, was for policy based operations," the report said.
"Overall, Mexico and Brazil were the largest borrowers, followed by Turkey, Pakistan, China, India and Argentina," it added.
