7th Annual Meeting of the Board of Governors of AIIB
Context
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Union Minister of Finance & Corporate Affairs attended the 7th Annual Meeting of the Board of Governors of Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB).
Key Details 7th Annual Meeting of the Board of Governors of AIIB
- Every year at the Annual Meeting, the Board of Governors meets to take key decisions on important matters relating to AIIB, and its future vision.
- India is a Founding Member and the second largest shareholder in AIIB.
- India also has the largest project portfolio within AIIB.
- The theme of this year’s Annual Meeting was “Sustainable Infrastructure Toward a Connected World”.
- The Finance Minister also highlighted that Prime Minister is actively leading India’s climate change response efforts through various programs such as ‘Lifestyle for Environment’ (or LiFE), among many others.
- The Finance Minister suggested that in order to ensure meaningful impact is achieved and resources are not scattered in multiple areas, AIIB needs to scale-up investments in key priority areas including clean energy and energy efficiency, disaster resilient infrastructure, social infrastructure with a special focus on education and health, and digital infrastructure.
Back to Basics
About AIIB
- A multilateral development bank that aims to improve economic and social outcomes in Asia.
- The bank currently has 105 members, including 14 prospective members from around the world.
- The breakdown of the 105 members by continents are as follows: 42 in Asia, 26 in Europe, 20 in Africa, 8 in Oceania, 8 in South America, and 1 in North America.
- The bank started operation after the agreement entered into force on 25 December 2015, after ratifications were received from 10 member states holding a total number of 50% of the initial subscriptions of the Authorized Capital Stock.
- The United Nations has addressed the launch of AIIB as having potential for “scaling up financing for sustainable development” and to improve the global economic governance.
- The starting capital of the bank was US$100 billion, equivalent to 2⁄3 of the capital of the Asian Development Bank and about half that of the World Bank.
- The bank was proposed by China in 2013 and the initiative was launched at a ceremony in Beijing in October 2014.
- It received the highest credit ratings from the three biggest rating agencies in the world, and is seen as a potential rival to the World Bank and IMF.
Governance of AIIB
- The bank’s governance structure is composed of the Board of Governors as the top-level and highest decision-making body.
- It is composed of 1 governor for each member state of the bank and in principle meets once a year.
- The board of directors, composed of 12 governors, each representing one or more member is responsible for daily operations and tasks delegated to it by the board of governors.
- Nine of those members are from within the Asia-Pacific region and three representing members outside the region.
- Of the non-regional directors, 1 constituency is made up of EU member states having the Euro as their currency, and 1 from other European countries.
- New members are considered for admission only once a year.
Source: PIB
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