Chinese Government provides an interest-free loan for the Kébir River Dam Construction Project

On March 9, 2004 and March 10, 2004, the Chinese Government and the Government of Tunisia signed an exchange of letters, which committed an interest-free loan for the Kébir River Dam Construction Project. Then, on April 8, 2004, the Tunisian Parliament passed a law, approving the interest-free loan. In addition to the Chinese Government, the Arab Fund for Economic and Social Development provided a $28 million loan for this project in 2000. The primary purpose of this project was to construct a dam on the Kébir River near the town of Tabarka (Dabarka) within the Gafsa Governorate (ولاية قفصة‎) to address irrigation and residential water shortages in the region. It consisted of 3 components: the construction of a clay core rockfill dam (with water storage capacity of 64 million cubic meters), the construction of a spillway tunnel, and the construction of a water pipeline. The dam was designed to be 70 meters high and 10 meters wide. Its crest was designed to be 560 meters long. Upon completion, the dam was designed to transport 35 million cubic meters of water per year to the Sidi Barrak Reservoir and reduce the risk of flooding within the Gafsa Governorate. China International Water & Electric Corporation (CWE) was the contractor responsible for implementation. Tunisia's Ministry of Agriculture and Water Resources, as the owner of the dam, was the ultimate beneficiary of this project and provided implementation support. CONCEPT S.A., a Tunisian consulting company, assisted in the creation of the preliminary, design plans, and tender documents, as well as supervised the work and provided technical assistance to commissioning. Construction began on January 1, 2003. At the time, the project had a timeline of 45 months; it was expected to be completed by the end of 2005. The project was nearing completion in January 2007. However, it experienced major delays due to domestic political unrest in Tunisia, construction material shortages, price increases, and technical capacity constraints among local construction firms. The Government of Tunisia repeatedly extended the required completion deadline of the project amidst the delays. CWE signed another project implementation contract (worth $16.65 million) on January 31, 2012. As of February 2015, the project had achieved a 26% completion rate and its new expected completion date was April 2016. According to the Arab Fund for Economic and Social Development, this project was completed some time before the end of 2017.

Additional details

1. This project is also known as the Kebir Dam Construction Project, the Wadi Al-Kabir Dam Construction Project, and the Kebir-Gafsa Barrage Project. The French project title is Barrage Kébir or La réalisation du barrage El Kébir du gouvernorat de Gafsa. The Chinese project title is 克比尔加夫萨水坝项目 or 加夫萨省埃尔.克比尔河水坝项目 or 突尼斯克比尔-加夫萨水坝 or 突尼斯克比尔. The Arabic project title is سد الكبير. 2. The loan that supported this project is not included in the database of Chinese loan commitments that SAIS-CARI published in July 2020. 3. China’s Ministry of Commerce (MOFCOM) has been coded as the specific Chinese Government institution responsible for financing this project because the vast majority of interest-free loans are provided by it. 4. Since the borrowings terms for the loan are unavailable, AidData has set maturity period to 20 years by default and grace period to 10 years by default, per China's Foreign Assistance White Paper (http://www.cidca.gov.cn/2018-08/06/c_129925064_3.htm), which states that the maturity of a MOFCOM interest-free loan is 20 years, with a drawdown period of 5 years, grace period of 5 years, and repayment over 10 years. AidData treats the drawdown period as providing 5 years of additional grace.

Number of official sources

15

Number of total sources

27