EIB to loan EUR 100 mln for Cyprus sewage

The European Investment Bank (EIB) announced on Friday the first tranche of a 70 mln euro financing to support the continuation (Phase B) of the Limassol District Sewerage and Drainage Project.
This is the first tranche of a 100 million euro credit facility approved by the EIB.
Teh EIB said in a statement that the loan contract was signed on Friday in Athens, on the occasion of the EIB Forum 2006, by Demetris Kontides, Chairman of the Sewerage Board of Limassol – Amathus (SBLA), and Gerlando Genuardi, EIB Vice President, in the presence of Cypriot Minister of Finance Michalis Sarris.
The full investment programme supported by the EIB comprises the ”Limassol-Amathus Sewerage and Drainage Project”, which is being implemented in several phases since 1992. Its objective is to provide adequate water management to the 165,000 residents, businesses and tourist facilities in the greater Limassol area including several villages near the southern coastal area.
The first phases, from 1992 to 2004, covered the construction of sewerage networks in the town centre and main tourist areas, and of the wastewater treatment plant at Moni. It also included house connections to the network, upgrading of the sewage system, pumping stations, and the construction of storm water drainage collectors.
The current project, Phase B, to be completed in 2012, aims to enable SBLA to comply with national legislation, transposed from the EC Directive for Urban Wastewater in 2004 and which is required under the EU Accession Treaty. It also extends sewerage networks and infrastructure including new pumping stations and upgrading of existing ones, construction of retention reservoirs and drainage in a previously unserviced area.
The EIB was a partner already in 1995 with a first loan for the first phase of the programme.
Kontides, also Mayor of Limassol, said “The loan, which covers 47% of the cost of the project for a life of 27 years, is of great importance for SBLA and for Cyprus, to build up an efficient and proper water network and the water management that we want, and in order to meet with the EC wastewater directives,” he said.