World Bank granted Tanzania a $1.6 billion loan to help it end repeated power outages, rebuild its railways and develop agriculture, Reuters said. The country’s minister of finance said in statement on Thursday that he secured the facility ahead of the annual meetings of World Bank and IMF, this week.

“The financial package will help the government to improve various infrastructure and speed up the development of the manufacturing sector, while at the same time improving the business environment for the private sector,” central bank governor Benno Ndulu said.

The financing includes a $200 million loan for State-owned power company Tanzania Electric Supply Company (TANESCO), to pay part of its arrears of about $250 million, this year.

It should be recalled that Tanzania, East Africa’s second largest economy, received in August 2016 another loan, of $600 million, from the World Bank, to expand the Dar Es Salaam port.

Alain Okpeitcha