Chinese Government provides a RMB 30 million grant - via a January 2017 ETCA - to provide assistance to Syrian refugees in Lebanon (Linked to Project ID#65737)

On January 13, 2017, the Chinese Government and the Government of Lebanon's Council for Development and Reconstruction (CDR) signed an Economic and Technical Cooperation Agreement (ETCA) which committed a RMB 30 million grant from the Chinese Government to Lebnon (captured by this project). The Chinese Government and CDR, the same day, signed another ETCA which committed a RMB 40 million grant from the Chinese Government to CDR (captured by linked project ID#65737). Both grants were for the provision of humanitarian assistance to Syrian refugees in Lebanon. On March 9, 2017, Chinese Ambassador to Lebanon Wang Kejian and President of the CDR Nabil El-Jisr signed an exchange of letters on behalf of their governments to confirm the project. These two grants were implemented by Lebanon’s Ministry of Social Affairs. The Chinese aid package included advanced medical equipment and daily necessities. The aid also included a batch of food. In addition to broad improvements to the living conditions of Syrian refugees, the project specifically sought to address the special needs of the disabled and other vulnerable groups among the Syrian refugee population in Lebanon. The Chinese Government and the Lebanese Government signed the project handover certificate in a ceremony marking the project's completion on March 16, 2018.

Additional details

This project is known as "Economic and Technical Cooperation - 2016/1 (Humanitarian Aid)" in the Lebanese Council for Development and Reconstruction's (CDR) database. The agreement number is 16317 (see "CDR Funding - Economic and Technical Cooperation - 2016/1 (Humanitarian Aid)"). According to September 2018 correspondence between AidData and Lebanon’s Ministry of Finance, the combined RMB 70 million grant commitment (which came in the form of separate RMB 30 million and RMB 40 million commitments) was not finalized until May 16, 2017 (see the "Grants" tab in "China Loans and grants (1).xlsx"). It is is unclear if this grant commitment is related to the batches of emergency assistance captured by project ID#65875 and ID#65971. This issue merits further investigation. As ETCAs are a financing mechanism specific to China's Ministry of Commerce, AidData has coded MOFCOM as the specific Chinese Government institution responsible for the provision of this grant.

Number of official sources

14

Number of total sources

18