Projects worth $47m underway in Bamyan

Commander of the New Zealand Provincial Reconstruction Team (PRT) serving in central Bamyan province has said the team launched several reconstruction projects worth 47 million US dollars in the province this year.
 
Colonel Martin Dransfield was speaking at a joint press with US envoy to Kabul Karl W. Eikenberry here on Thursday.
The Kiwi PRT commander said the projects included construction of roads, health clinics, buildings for district headquarters, small bridges, retaining walls, school buildings and construction of a separate building for a child healthcare ward at the provincial civil hospital.

He said the projects would cost 47 million US dollars. Work on some projects, costing 12 million US dollars, had been completed and the remaining projects would take six more months to complete, he said.

Dransfield promised the PRT would complete developmental projects worth 200 million dollars in the province. The proposed projects included the construction of the 162 kilometers of road between Baghlan Doshi and Bamyan province.

He added the said road construction would cost 133 million US dollars with support from the United States Agency for International Development (USAID).
The commander said the projects were a joint venture of the governments of US, New Zealand, Singapore and others. "Due to peaceful environment in Bamyan, the international community wants to bring more uplift schemes here," he said.

Speaking on the occasion, Eikenberry said besides carrying out reconstruction projects, the PRT had been training local government officials in their capacity building and ensuring good governance.