London — The African Development Bank announced on Friday that its African Development Fund (ADF) has approved a 25.23 million US dollar loan and a 3.05 million dollar grant to finance an urban water supply and sanitation project in Mozambique.

The four-year project is to be run by the Ministry of Public Works and Housing and will begin in January. It aims to improve water supply and sanitation in the southern cities of Chokwe, Inhambane, Maxixe and Xai-Xai, extending these services to low-income urban areas. The project includes training programmes on sanitation, the environment, solid waste management, HIV/AIDS and malaria.

The project aims to improve living standards by increasing the water supply coverage rate in these cities from 37 per cent to 65 per cent and to reduce the incidence of water borne diseases by 25 per cent by 2007. Access to a safe water supply will reduce the time spent collecting water and thereby free women to engage in income-generating activities. It is hoped that reducing the time spent fetching water will also result in children, particularly girls, spending more time at school.

The loan and grant will be used to finance all the foreign exchange needs and half the local costs of the project. The total cost is estimated at 31.73 million dollars.

The African Development Bank has operated in Mozambique since 1977, and has transferred 665 million dollars to projects in the country.