Toll Expressway to Improve Access for Poor and Ethnic Minorities in Central Asia

Manila, Dec 16, 2005 (ABN Newswire) - A 64-km toll expressway will be built in one of the poorest areas of the People's Republic of China (PRC) with the help of a US$208 million ADB loan.

The Jishou-Chadong expressway aims to spur economic growth in Hunan's rural and mountainous Xiangxi Autonomous Prefecture, where economic growth has been stunted due to limited road access, by linking the area to the Changsha-Chongqing corridor - one of the high-priority western corridors of the PRC Government.

The project area covers one city and four counties in which 80% of the population lives in rural areas and more than three quarters of the people are from ethnic minorities. Inadequate road infrastructure is a major cause of the area's high incidence of rural poverty, which exceeds 30%.

"Improved transportation will increase income opportunities from cash crop farming or seasonal work involving migration, promote more contact with urban centers, and make trips to markets and social services easier," says Eunkyung Kwon, an ADB senior transport economist.

Better roads enhance people's quality of life by providing easier access to social services, for instance, by encouraging more teachers and doctors to work in rural areas, she adds.

Traffic on the expressway is forecast to more than double from 6,000 annual average daily traffic in 2010 to 12,650 in 2019, or an average annual increase of 8%.

The project involves construction of 64 km of toll expressway from Jishou to Chadong, including a large suspension bridge, 13 tunnels, 36 other large bridges, interchanges, toll stations, and service areas.

Aside from the expressway, the project will also upgrade 129 km of local roads, improving access to 52 poor villages, as well as provide consulting services and training to enhance the quality of construction, asset management, local road maintenance, transport services, and road safety.

The ADB loan, from its ordinary capital resources, has a 25-year term, including a grace period of five years. Interest rate will be determined in accordance with ADB's London interbank offered rate-based lending facility.

The total project cost is $519.51 million, of which the PRC's Ministry of Communications will provide $59.74 million, the Hunan Provincial Government, $94.58 million, and the State Development Bank $157.19 million. The project will be managed by the Hunan provincial Communications Department.

Since 1991, ADB has extended 31 loans totaling $6.2 billion to finance 4,391 km of expressways and 8,237 km of local road networks in PRC. ADB has also supplied 54 technical assistance packages totaling $28.3 million to the road sector.