Washington, United States, 10 October 2022 – President of the Islamic Development Bank (IsDB) and Group Chairman, H.E. Dr. Muhammad Al Jasser, now in Washington to attend the Annual Meetings of the International Monetary Fund and World Bank Group has held separate meetings with the Vice Presidents of the World Bank where he discussed further consolidation of joint development efforts including the ongoing co-financing operations.

In his meeting with  Mrs. Victoria Kwakwa, World Bank Vice President for Eastern and Southern Africa, the IsDB President stated that IsDB values its excellent relations with the World Bank and is committed to strengthening this cooperation in the interest of the socio-economic development of the member countries.

Underlining that IsDB shares the ambitions of the World Bank to work towards more and better jobs as well as regional economic integration, Dr. Al Jasser stipulated that, IsDB, as the AAA-rated MDB of the global South, looks forward to boosting its mutual cooperation with the World Bank through launching an Africa-focused deep dive; addressing the food crisis in Africa; regional integration and connectivity, digital inclusion; joint analytical work and knowledge products; joint interventions and co-financing of operations in Common MCs; and working together on developing and enhancing sector policies.

Later in the day, the IsDB President met with World Bank VP for Western and Central Africa, Mr. Ousmane Diagana, who leads the World Bank’s engagements with 22 countries in Western and Central Africa where IsDB oversees an active portfolio of 315 projects worth US$10 billion in the 16 common member countries. 

Several topics featured during the meeting including joint appraisal and follow-up on the implementation of the projects as well as joint action to address food insecurity in addition to fragility, conflict, and violence (FCV) agenda in member countries. 

The two international development powerhouses have so far co-financed 61 projects in their common member countries that have yielded US$7.3 billion in co-financing. Further, WB and IsDB are co-financing 18 projects in Africa, which have generated US$ 2.2 billion in co-financing.

Elsewhere, IsDB Group Chairman Dr. Al Jasser held talks with Managing Director of the International Finance Corporation (IFC), Makhtar Diop, on the sidelines of the IMF-World Bank Group Annual meetings where the two sides deliberated on ways to scale up cooperation between IsDB’s private sector development arm, the Islamic Corporation for Development of the Private Sector (ICD) and IFC on public-private partnerships, manufacturing, and agribusiness projects across common member countries.