ADB awards four projects

Road Connectivity Sector I Project, Teacher Education Project and Small Town Water Supply and Sanitation Project were awarded by Asian Development Bank (ADB) for their best performance among ADB-supported project teams in Nepal.
The three were awarded the Outstanding Project Management Team Award. The Community Livestock Development was also presented a Special Recognition.Project secretary for the Ministry of Agriculture and Cooperatives, Shankar P Panday; secretaries for the Ministry of Physical Planning and Works, Purna P Kadariya and Uma Kanta Jha and secretary for the Ministry of Education Ram Swarup Sinha presented the awards to the winning project teams at a special ceremony at ADB's Nepal Resident Mission (NRM) today.
"These awards recognise the project teams' excellent performance, efficiency in implementation and achievements of targets -- both statistical as well as on the ground," said Barry J Hitchcock, country director of Nepal Resident Mission. "We have seen excellent results in terms of portfolio performance in Nepal last year and we appreciate the efforts made by the project teams in delivering the desired results," he added.
The Road Connectivity Sector I Project aims to support construction and upgrading of 10 feeder roads measuring a total of about 490 kms whereas the Teacher Education Project is a follow-up of the ADB's first Primary Education Development Project and aims to establish an effective and sustainable teacher education system for primary education.Similarly, Small Town Water Supply and Sanitation Project assists the government in providing water supply, drainage and sanitation facilities in 29 small towns with an average population of about 18,000 and Community Livestock Development Project aims to reduce the incidence of poverty in rural areas of 48 districts through intensive livestock programme, livestock processing and marketing and higher-altitude livelihood pilot programmes.
NRM instituted the award scheme in 1996 to encourage project staff of ADB-assisted projects to improve portfolio performance in support of its over-arcing goal of poverty reduction.The Manila-based lender is dedicated to reducing poverty in the Asia and Pacific region through inclusive economic growth, environmentally sustainable growth and regional integration. Established in 1966 -- ADB is owned by 67 members -- 48 from the region. In 2008, it approved $10.5 billion of loans, $811.4 million of grant projects, and technical assistance amounting to $274.5 million.