ADDIS ABABA, Dec. 7 (Xinhua) -- Ethiopia and the World Bank (WB) on Friday signed a 2.7 billion Ethiopian birr (about 100 million U.S. dollars) financing agreement aimed to help Ethiopia protect its natural resources and promote livelihood sectors.
The loan agreement, which is said to finance the Resilient Land and Livelihoods Project in Ethiopia, was signed by Ethiopian Finance Minister Ahmed Shide, and Carrie Turk, World Bank's director for Ethiopia, Sudan and South Sudan, in Ethiopia's capital Addis Ababa.
The Resilient Land and Livelihoods (RLL) project, among other things, aims to improve the east African country's climate resilience, land productivity and carbon storage.
In addition to building climate resilience, the RLL project also aspires to help rural communities diversify their livelihood activities, according to the finance ministry.
Shide said more than 645,000 households in Ethiopia's six major regional states are expected to benefit from the RLL project, with financial backing from the bank.
The World Bank is also Ethiopia's key financial partner in its aspirations to improve electrification coverage across the country.
Ethiopia aims to reach full coverage by 2025, from the current 58.13 percent, according to the Ministry of Water, Irrigation and Energy (MWIE).
Bizuneh Tolcha, the MWIE's spokesperson, told Xinhua recently that the World Bank had recently provided 375 million dollars in financial support for Ethiopia's eight-year electrification roadmap.
Ethiopia needs a total of 1.5 billion dollars for the first five years of the universal electrification program, according to Tolcha.
