Islamic Development Bank launches $1.5 billion fund

Ahmed Mohammed Ali, President of the Islamic Development Bank (IDB), said a fund worth $1.5 billion is being created to make investments in infrastructure projects in member states.

At a press conference in Washington on Tuesday, Ali said the IDB infrastructure fund would be a limited partnership with a capital of $1 billion and an Islamic finance facility of 500 million U.S. dollars.

He defined the target sectors for the fund as including power, telecommunications, transportation, energy, natural resources, petrochemicals, water and other infrastructure related sectors.

Noting that Governments were experiencing declining revenues, he said the fund was intended to contribute to filling part of the great need for infrastructure investment.

calling it the first private investment vehicle to concentrate on infrastructure development throughout the Islamic world, he said the IDB had committed 250 million dollars to the fund. A further 200 million dollars had been committed to the new fund by the Geneva-based Dar Al-maal Alislami trust, chaired by Prince Mohammed Al-faisal Al-saud.