China Eximbank provides RMB 182.9 million government concessional loan for Supply of 100 Railway Passenger Carriages Project

On May 15, 2007, China Eximbank and the Government of Sri Lanka signed an RMB 182,997,446 ($27,078,543) government concessional loan (GCL) agreement for the Supply of 100 Railway Passenger Carriages Project. The GCL carried the following borrowing terms: a 2% interest rate and a 12-year repayment period. As of 2008, it had disbursed approximately RMB 157,937,607.42 (Rs. 2,462,500,000). The borrower made repayments worth RMB 14,639,796 in 2018, RMB 14,639,796 in 2019, RMB 14,639,796 in 2020 and RMB 14,639,795 in 2021. The loan's amount outstanding was RMB 73,198,978 as of December 31, 2017, RMB 58,559,182 as of December 31, 2018, RMB 43,919,386 as of December 31, 2019, RMB 29,279,590 as of December 31, 2020, RMB 14,639,795 as of December 31, 2021, and RMB 7,319,898 as of June 30, 2022. The purpose of the project was to supply of 100 railway passenger carriages to Sri Lanka Railways. China National Machinery Import and Export Corporation (CMC) was responsible for supplying the passenger carriages. This project was successfully completed on January 31, 2008. However, the project has encountered debt repayment problems. On April 12, 2022, the Government of Sri Lanka announced a ‘pre-emptive’ sovereign debt default, noting that it would suspend debt repayments to all external creditors other than multilateral institutions. Its decision to suspend external debt service reportedly affected all China Eximbank loans with amounts outstanding at the time of the announcement.

Additional details

1. The Government of Sri Lanka loan key number is 2007014. 2. In 2007, the Chinese Government also committed a loan for the provision of 15 diesel multiple units (see Project ID#33260), and it committed another loan in 2010 for the provision of an additional 13 diesel multiple units (see Project ID#49343).

Number of official sources

25

Number of total sources

30