CAF celebrates its 50th anniversary with a high-level conference
On the occasion of its 50th anniversary, CAF - Latin American Development Bank - is organising a high-level virtual conference that will address the main socio-economic challenges facing the region from a historical perspective. Joseph Stiglitz, winner of the Nobel Prize in Economics, will present in an opening speech his vision of the global economic situation and the challenges facing Latin America in the coming years.
Afterwards, a panel consisting of Alicia Bárcena, Executive Secretary of ECLAC, Ángel Gurría, Secretary-General of the OECD, Enrique Iglesias, former Ibero-American Secretary-General and former President of the IDB, will discuss the situation facing Latin America as a result of the COVID-19 crisis and analyse its impact on the Agenda 2030 for Sustainable Development. The moderator will be Andrea Bernal, journalist NTN 24. The opening and closing of the CAF conference will be led by Luis Carranza, Executive President of the institution.
When: Thursday 11 June 2020
Time: 10:00 am Colombia, Peru, Ecuador, Mexico and Panama / 11:00 am Bolivia, Venezuela and Trinidad and Tobago / 12:00 pm Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay and Uruguay / 7:00 pm Spain
Where: Online, will be broadcast from this page: https://www.caf.com/es/actualidad/eventos/2020/06/claves-para-repensar-el-presente-y-futuro-de-america-latina/
CAF - Latin American Development Bank - was born in the early 1970s with a capital of 25 million dollars provided by the five founding countries (Bolivia, Ecuador, Colombia, Peru and Venezuela). Today, there are 19 shareholder countries (including Spain and Portugal) and $8 billions of capital in subscribed. Its historical evolution makes the CAF one of the few success stories of Latin American integration.
In 50 years, the organization has financed $188 billion of projects in the fields of water, electricity, housing, education, health, mobility and telecommunications that have improved the quality of life of at least 110 million Latin Americans. These figures include $11 billions for 77 integration projects over the past 20 years.
The institution's contributions to regional development are also noteworthy: 77 million Latin Americans have benefited from urban mobility projects in the last ten years; 29 million have benefited from water and sanitation projects in the last fifteen years; 2 million children and young people have benefited from education initiatives in the last fifteen years. In addition, in 2019 alone, we have financed the construction, improvement and rehabilitation of 1,294 km of roads, supported 23,213 SMEs, financed energy infrastructure that will benefit more than 7 million people, and neutralized greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions generated since the beginning of our operations, with the acquisition of 162,986 carbon credits from a project in the Peruvian Amazon.
"The success of CAF is also the success of the governments of the region, which have shown over the years that they can put aside their political tensions and respect a mandate that ultimately aims to improve the quality of life of all Latin Americans by providing technical and financial support to national and regional development programs," said Luis Carranza, CAF's Director General. The validity of the institution was also evident during the crisis generated by COVID-19, as it made two lines of credit available to its member countries: one of USD 350 million for emergency health care and another of USD 2.5 billion for counter-cyclical economic policies.