After Covid lull, BRICS development bank eyes making $5 billion in loans in 2024

After a lull in its business caused by the Covid-19 pandemic, the New Development Bank (NDB) – the development banking arm of BRICS – aims to make $5 billion in loans in calendar year 2024, its Vice President Zhou Qiangwu was reported as saying on Tuesday, March 26.

During the Covid-19 period, "our business has been somewhat affected, and now everything is going back on track”, news agency Reuters quoted Zhou as saying, while speaking to reporters in Beijing. He was attending the annual Bao Forum in the Chinese capital.

While Zhou did not share details on the bank’s performance, he noted that China and India – two of the largest economies of Asia – have received slightly more investment from NDB as compared to other BRICS member nations.

Most recently, NDB signed three loan agreements with India, amounting to nearly $700 million, to develop rural roads in Gujarat, rejuvenate Manipur’s Lamphelpat water body and develop an integrated sewage system in the city of Imphal. The pacts were inked on January 12, 2024.

The bank, in November 2023, issued its first non-sovereign loan in China amounting to $50 million for infrastructure projects in the eastern Zhejiang Province. In 2021, NDB had extended a loan of $0.97 billion to support China’s economic recovery.

According to Zhou, China is expected to clock an economic growth of 5% in 2024. The projection is almost similar to the 5.2% growth recorded by the country in 2023.

Headquartered in Shanghai, the NDB was set up by BRICS – the multilateral grouping of Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa – in 2015, nearly three years after India proposed its creation at the group’s keynote summit.