Chinese Government provides RMB 30 million interest-free loan for Phase 1 of Campus Telephone Network Project (Linked to Project ID#65100 and Project ID#85254)

According to a dataset of foreign-financed projects that the Syrian Planning Commission (SPC) provided to UNDP Syria in May 2011, the Chinese Government provided an RMB 30 million ($4,416,000) interest-free loan (captured in Project ID#67232) and an RMB 4 million (USD 588,800) grant (captured in Project ID#65100) to the Government of Syria’s Ministry of Higher Education in 2003 for Phase 1 of the Campus Network Project. The purpose of the project was to connect the colleges and directorates of the University of Damascus via an internal telephone network and equip students with a prepaid telephone card for reaching out to their families living in the city. ZTE Corporation was the contractor responsible for implementation. The originally anticipated project implementation start date was January 1, 2003 and the originally anticipated project implementation end date was December 31, 2005. The first telephone site supported by this project was established at the end of 2005, The project was officially completed and handed over to the local authorities on June 13, 2006. The Chinese Government also financed Phase 2 of Campus Network Project (as captured in Project ID#85254).

Additional details

This project is also known as the Campus Network Project. The Chinese project title is 校园网项目. The Arabic project title is مشروع توسعالشبكة الهاتفية or مشروع الشبكة الهاتفية التي تربط الجامعة بالمدينة الجامعية. Since loan terms for the interest-free 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 period of interest-free loans 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

7

Number of total sources

13