At the meeting the Executive Director of MCA Moldova Valentina Badrajan reported on the Compact activities implemented by the Millennium Challenge Account Moldova and the use of the Compact budget in 2012.
The Steering Committee also approved the budget for 2013 amounting to about 84 million USD, of which 49 million USD will be used for the rehabilitation of the Sarateni-Soroca road segment, about 29 million USD for activities under the Transition to High Value Agriculture Project and program administration, and the MCA Moldova work plan for 2013. According to the work plan, the major activities planned for 2013 are continuation of the Sarateni-Soroca road rehabilitation works and start of rehabilitation of irrigation systems. 60% of the rehabilitation works planned under the Road Rehabilitation project is expected to be carried out this year.
Also in 2013 MCA Moldova will start rehabilitating the access roads to schools, hospitals and other social facilities for the communities covered by the road rehabilitation project and will outsource additional designing of a road segment of about 650 meters to the fire station in Soroca to be restored with the support of the U.S. Department of Defence.
Under the Transition to High Value Agriculture Project in 2013 the technical designs of the irrigation systems are expected to be completed and the invitation for bids for construction of irrigation systems to be announced, while the proper rehabilitation works are expected to start in April-May 2013.
According to the 2013 work plan this year eight water quantity monitoring stations will be installed to improve the water management.
To develop the post-harvest infrastructure, the Credit Facility will continue providing loans to agricultural producers, associations of agricultural producers, businesswomen in the rayons of Ungheni, Nisporeni, Leova, Cahul, Orhei, Criuleni, Dubasari and Anenii Noi.
Prime Minister Vlad Filat appreciated that Compact identified the best options in terms of the quality and rehabilitation costs of the irrigation infrastructure and recommended the representatives of public authorities to take this experience into account in other investment programs.
At the meeting the members of the Steering Committee approved the report on Compact implementation in 2012, finding that the Compact activities had been largely implemented according to the approved work plan.
The Compact projects aim at contributing in the period of 2010-2015 to increasing the income of the Moldovan people and providing investments in road rehabilitation, rehabilitation of irrigation systems and transition to high value agriculture.
