BRICS new Development Bank authorises Algeria to join, approves up to $1bn loan for water projects in South Africa

Algeria has been authorised to become a member of the BRICS New Development Bank (NDB), the bank’s president, Dilma Rousseff, said on Saturday. Also the bank approved a new loan of up to $1 billion to finance water and sanitation projects among poorer households in South Africa, the bank said in a statement.  The multilateral development bank, the NDB was established by the BRICS group of developing countries – Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa – in 2015. Bangladesh, Egypt, the United Arab Emirates and Uruguay were admitted as new members of the bank in 2021 as part of an expansion drive. “We have a process to authorise new members to the bank … Algeria was authorised to become a member of the bank,” Rousseff told journalists on the sidelines of the ninth annual meeting of the bank in Cape Town.

The loan will be used under South Africa’s Municipal Infrastructure Grant, a conditional grant used by municipalities to reduce backlogs and enhance the provision of basic services to poorer communities. The bank, which was set up by the BRICS group of emerging economies in 2015, also approved a loan of $150 million equivalent in the local Chinese currency renminbi to China’s Bank of Communications Financial Leasing for a liquefied natural gas (LNG) transportation project. The loan will be used to acquire at least three LNG carriers to help address rising demand for the super-cooled gas in China, as well as help close the gap between demand and supply of LNG carrier capacity, the NDB statement said.