The visiting president of the World Bank Group, Jim Yong Kim has assured Sierra Leone of his institution’s continued intervention in dealing with the Ebola outbreak that has killed more than 1,600 people.
At a joint press conference with President Ernest Bai Koroma, Mr Kim said “finishing the job on Ebola and getting to zero cases” was crucial as well as “not waiting to finish [before] beginning to work on economic recovery”.
He said the bank and other partners were committed to supporting the Sierra Leone government in its emergency response and the longer term economic recovery.
“We’re accelerating our support to Sierra Leone and we plan to deliver a comprehensive economic recovery package in just two years instead of three”
He said the three-year plan would be frontloaded and disbursed in two years with the bank intervening in five key areas.
Dr Kim said the World Bank had “already provided 160 million to Sierra Leone for the Ebola crisis and we will continue to support the objective of getting to zero cases as soon as possible”.
“We’re concerned that agriculture production has dropped significantly as a result of this Ebola epidemic. We will help farmers recover from this crisis by building feeder roads that connect more farmers to markets. We must make sure that the Ebola epidemic is not followed by a food security crisis” he said, and pledged the Bank’s commitment to help with electricity and job-creation.
“We need to help Sierra Leoneans get jobs to help people recover from income losses as a result of the epidemic” he said.
He also pledged they would respond to “the shortage of finance for businesses” and would work to provide liquidity for local banks which he said would support especially small and medium size enterprises and farmers.
President Ernest Bai Koroma thanked the Breton Wood institution for its support which includes payment of the country’s frontline health workers.
“While we do appreciate the increase presence I must say that there is still the need for us to address the gaps that still exist in some areas of our intervention. As at today we are at 406 bed capacity…total requirement is 1,500. We have five operations labs…and we need four more labs…” and more contact tracers because of the spread of the virus which has moved from the east to the northwest including the capital, Freetown.
© Politico 04
