Ecuador will strengthen cultural heritage protection with IDB support

Jan 11, 2012. Ecuador will carry out a broad program to protect and restore its cultural heritage with the help of a loan for $37.8 million from the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB).

The program, which will be carried out by the Ministry for Cultural Heritage Coordination, includes some 10 large demonstration projects and asset recovery initiatives in various cities in the country.

The country’s National Institute of Cultural Heritage estimates that Ecuador has some three million cultural heritage material assets, of which only 2.7 percent are registered.

This low level of registration hinders Ecuador’s efforts to protect, conserve and recover the country’s cultural wealth. Among assets lacking registration are more than 1.3 million pieces of art, 1.2 million archaeological artifacts, 40,000 pieces of real estate, 15,000 archaeological sites, 4,000 institutional files, 2,000 collections of documents, and 80 historical archives.

The IDB loan is expected to finance the registry of more than 300,000 cultural property assets over the next five years.

Registering and systematizing information on cultural heritage will help to improve the country’s ability to formulate public policies to support development. The preservation and restoration of the country’s cultural heritage is a priority area of work for the government, on a par with social and economic sectors.

The demonstration projects will be carried out in the municipalities of Zaruma-Portovelo (Zaruma is a UNESCO Cultural Heritage Site candidate), in Santa Elena (the location of Valdivia, considered the cradle of Ecuadorian archeology) and in Puyo, which will serve as a model for the country’s Amazon region.

Recuperation and protection activities will also be carried out in the municipalities of Ambato, Vinces, Gualaceo, Rocafuerte, and the Malqui-Machay archaeological zone in Cotopaxi.

The projects were selected objectively on the basis of technical relevance, planning, geographic distribution, number of previous interventions, state of preservation, and potential benefit to priority subsectors (transport, construction, business, environment, and tourism).

The program also includes implementation of management models for sustainable protection and innovative methodologies.

The IDB loan was extended for a 25-year term with a five-year grace period and an interest rate based on LIBOR

For more information about Projects in Ecuador see ANDEAN AMERICA Projects

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Ecuador expands access to microcredit with IDB support

News Releases. Dec 7, 2011. Ecuador will expand access to microcredit, particularly among low-income women, through a $50 million loan approved by the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) aimed at increasing employment opportunities and reducing poverty.

The National Program for Finance, Entrepreneurship, and Economic Solidarity (PNFPEES) will be the executing agency for the program, which will contribute to its strategy for fostering economic inclusion with particular emphasis on financing for women entrepreneurs.

"We expect that by 2015 the program will provide loans to approximately 25,000 microentrepreneurs," said Rosa Matilde Guerrero, IDB specialist."We also anticipate that these credits will lead to the creation of at least 5,000 new jobs over the next four years."

The program is intended to result in an 60 percent increase in credit available in districts with high levels of poverty, and at least 54 percent of the credit operations will benefit women microentrepreneurs.

Ecuador has seen a significant expansion in microfinance over the past eight years.The total loan portfolio of microfinance institutions has increased from $73.2 million to nearly $2,5 billion, an average annual growth of 405 percent.In addition, the total number of entrepreneurs served by this sector has expanded at an annual average of 232 percent over the same period, rising from about 60,000 to more than one million customers.

Nevertheless, says the IDB’s Guerrero, the sector has still has much room for growth, as evidenced by an insufficient supply of microfinance products, especially credit.This is due to the high geographic concentration of credit for microenterprises, high operating costs, and difficulty in meeting collateral requirements.

The PNFPEES was created in 2009 to provide loans to financial services organizations in high-poverty areas that have limited access to credit. The IDB loan will help meet this goal.

The IDB loan is for a term of 25 years with a grace period of four years and an interest rate based on LIBOR.

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Ecuador.Global Credit Program for Microfinance Support

The program will promote: (i) greater financial inclusion for a population with little or no access to microfinance services, supporting increased credit availability through microfinance products and reduced funding difficulties and asset-liability mismatches for PFSs; and (ii) equitable treatment for women, to be verified through a credit impactassessment methodology.

IDB.EC-L1073:Global Credit Program for Microfinance Support in Ecuador

WTO Trade Policy Review: Ecuador

The second review of the trade policies and practices of Ecuador takes place on 14 and 16 November 2011. The basis for the review is a report by the WTO Secretariat and a report by the Government of Ecuador

Secretariat report A detailed report written independently by the WTO Secretariat.

• Executive summary
• Full report

Ecuador.The impact of teaching quality on children's learning

This project is an impact evaluation of the effect of the interactions between teachers and children in the classroom, as well as other teacher characteristics, on learning in first grade, in particular of the poorest students.

Ecuador.The impact of teaching quality on children's learning

Ecuador to improve access to electricity in rural and marginal urban areas

The Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) has approved a $40 million loan with which Ecuador will increase and improve access to electricity in rural and marginal urban communities.

"The loan will finance projects that will connect 30,000 households in rural and marginal urban areas to electrical power and improve the service that 210,000 other homes have today," said IDB project team leader Arnaldo Vieira de Carvalho.

To ensure economically viable, sustainable, reliable, and high-quality access to electricity, the project includes institutional strengthening and training in the formulation, implementation, monitoring, and economic and financial evaluation of rural electrification projects.

Bringing electricity to a community typically allows for a longer workday in the home and the use of tools that increase domestic productivity. By the project’s completion in 2013, the reading time available to children and adults in dwellings receiving electricity for the first time will increase 50 percent; the sense of security and quality of life in benefited communities is expected to rise 40 percent; and the projected number of economically active persons per household and of businesses per community will double.

In 2009, an estimated 92.6 percent of Ecuadoreans had electricity (95.7 percent in urban areas and 84.7 percent in rural areas). Preliminary data from the 2010 census indicate that approximately one million people had no electricity. The government is targeting 97 percent national coverage by 2013.

The IDB has supported the development of Ecuador’s electricity sector for more than 40 years.

The loan is for 25 years, with a two-year grace period and an interest rate based on LIBOR. The Ministry of Electricity and Renewable Energy, supported by the National Electricity Board, is responsible for the project, which is part of Ecuador’s Program for Rural and Marginal-Urban Electrification (FERUM).

IDB. News Releases.Nov 3, 2011

Should cash transfers be confined to the poor ? implications for poverty and inequality in Latin America

This paper compares for 13 Latin American countries the poverty and inequality impacts of cash transfer programs that are given to all children and the elderly (that is, "categorical" transfers), to programs of equal budget that are confined to the poor within each population group (that is, "poverty targeted" transfers).

The analysis finds that both the incidence of poverty and the depth of the poverty gap are important factors affecting the relative effectiveness of categorical versus poverty targeted transfers. The comparison of transfers to children and the elderly also supports the view that choosing carefully categories of beneficiaries is almost as important as targeting the poor for achieving a high poverty and inequality impact.

Overall, the findings suggest that although in the Latin American context poverty targeting tends to deliver higher poverty impacts, there are circumstances under which categorical targeting confined to geographical regions (sometimes called "geographic targeting") may be a valid option to consider. This is particularly the case in low-income countries with widespread pockets of poverty.

Argentina,Bolivia,Brazil,Chile,Colombia,Dominican Republic,Ecuador,El Salvador

Author:Acosta,Pablo;Leite,Phillipe;Rigolini,Jamele.Document. Date: 2011/11/01.Document Type:  Policy Research Working Paper.Report Number: WPS5875.Volume No: 1 of 1

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