Chinese Finance Minister Lou Jiwei disclosed that China will donate 100 million US dollars to the 11th replenishment of the Asian Development Fund to help low-income members of the Asian Development Bank (ADB) including Pakistan in reducing poverty.

The AIIB and the ADB are already discussing projects for co-financing in the road and water sectors. The first of these projects is expected to be Pakistan’s M4 highway project, a 64 km stretch of motorway connecting Shorkot to Khanewal in Punjab province.

The two institutions will undertake regular high-level consultations between them and joint data collection to promote the implementation of the sustainable development goals and the COP21 climate agreement, according to a press release by the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB).

The ADB signed a memorandum of understanding with Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB) this week to strengthen cooperation for sustainable growth. China will support the ADB as always and deepen its all-round cooperation with the Bank, Lou added while addressing ADB’s Board of Governors’ meeting in Frankfurt.

According to the agreement, the AIIB and the ADB will strengthen cooperation, including co-financing, at the strategic and technical levels on the basis of complementarity, value added institutional strengths, comparative advantages, and mutual benefit.

Chinese Finance Minister Lou Jiwei on Wednesday called for speeding up structural reforms to enhance the flexibility and resilience of the economy.

Speaking at the 49th annual meeting of the Board of Governors of Asian Development Bank (ADB), Lou said the world economy was still faced with severe challenges and countries should speed up their structural reforms to enhance the flexibility and resilience of their economies and foster sustainable growth by means of innovation.

As an important institution of multilateral development, the ADB should adapt itself to changes in a proactive way and work out a more forward-looking development strategy that includes cooperation between high and middle-income countries, Lou said.

He maintained that ADS should develop innovative policies, improve the quality of its projects, improve its governance structure and raise institutional strength, comprehensively expand its partnership with existing multilateral development aid agencies and new institutions, including the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB) and the BRICS Development Bank.

He also suggested ADB strengthen its partnership with private institutions through the public-private partnerships (PPP). This year marks the 50th anniversary of the establishment of ADB and the 30th anniversary of China’s cooperation with the ADB.