The Governing Council of Millenium Challenge Account-Armenia SNCO met
at the Office of Government, presided at by GC Chairman, RA Prime
Minister Tigran Sargsyan.
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Wednesday, 10th of December, 2008
The Governing Council of Millenium Challenge Account-Armenia SNCO met
at the Office of Government, presided at by GC Chairman, RA Prime
Minister Tigran Sargsyan.
The Council discussed and approved a package consisting of the request
for a tenth disbursement and attached documents, inclusive of the
annual report, summary quarterly report, performance monitoring chart,
disbursement pre-conditions, procurement reports, procurement and
working plans. It was noted that under the mentioned request, the
MCA-Armenia expects to be allocated USD 6,811,305 next quarter
(January-March, 2009) through the general financing system. Quarterly
expenditure will rise to USD 7,109,153.
According to the MCA-Armenia SNCO Chief Executive Director, the
requested funds will cover the following program activities: Rural Road
Rehabilitation, Irrigated Agriculture, Monitoring and Evaluation,
Program Administration and Monitoring. Ara Hovsepyan also mentioned
that thanks to the funds available from the government, the cost of
building activities will rise to USD 11,669,871 (without VAT) by the
end of this quarter, with the actual and projected spending for the
month of December totaling to USD 28,081,321.
In particular, the following activities were carried out in the period
under review: under the Rural Road Rehabilitation Activity, the repairs
of a 24.5km-long road section in the western part of Armenia are
nearing completion. Work is underway under the first-package contracts,
including the rehabilitation of a 273km-long road section to a total
cost of USD 60.3 million. Under the Irrigated Agriculture Activity, 4
tertiary canals have been built in 4 rural settlements. It was noted
that by the end of this year, there will be finalized design packages
for 6 water-mains, 7 gravity systems and 18 pump-stations to be built
in all marzes of the Republic next year. Over 18.000 program
beneficiaries have so far been taught on the subject of
intra-organizational water management and high-value output under the
From Water-to-Market component of the Irrigated Agriculture Activity.
Under the same program, 128 pilot farms have been created and over 130
agricultural loans have been extended to total sum of USD 1.5 million.
Once approved by the GC Chairman, the request package will be sent off
to the MCC for consideration.
The meeting similarly discussed and endorsed the draft contract on
Rehabilitation of Six Water-Mains (Package No.1) under the
Infrastructure component of the Irrigated Agriculture Activity.
The council was briefed on the targets of the 2nd stage of the loan
component of the From Water-to-Markey Activity of the Irrigated
Agriculture Project. Then, the meeting discussed the operational
guidelines entitled "Administrative Policy and Procedures for Lending
Program."
In conclusion, the council members were presented reference notes on
the approaches and technologies used in engineering water-mains and
tertiary canals, the audits and other checks of MCA-Armenia SNCO’s
financial and program activities etc.