Jeddah, Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, 13 April 2021 – President of Islamic Development Bank (IsDB), Dr. Bandar Hajjar, and Mr. Jin Liquin, President of Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB) have exchanged views on promoting cooperation and exchange of expertise.

The meeting stressed the importance of building health infrastructure in least developed countries to be prepared for possible future health pandemics. In this context, Dr. Hajjar updated Mr. Liquin on the IsDB efforts to help Member Countries in the framework of the Bank’s 3Rs (Respond, Restore and Restart) program.

During the virtual meeting, Dr. Hajjar congratulated Mr. Liquin on his election as Chair of the Heads of MDBs Meetings for 2021 and reiterated support for AIIB’s chairmanship by expressing readiness to share his own experience as the 2020 Chair of the Heads of MDBs Meetings in all areas especially in climate change, health, and digital infrastructure.

“Historically, there was minimum interaction between Heads of MDBs and G20. However, in 2020, IsDB decided to change the rules of the game and, therefore, turned the Heads of MDBs forum into a channel for collaboration with the G20 governments. It was a unique experience,” he further told Mr. Liquin.

The IsDB President, then, expressed readiness to support the AIIB President to take over this coordination role with the G20 Presidency as Head of MDBs Meetings for 2021 while underlining that in the upcoming meeting of the Heads of MDBs he would be mainly discussing two main topics; ‘building a unified vision on vaccines’ as well as the issue of ‘inclusive globalization.’ 

Furthermore, he highlighted the significance of expanding bilateral cooperation between IsDB and AIIB and while expressing thanks to Mr. Linquin for his interest in IsDB’s sustainable Sukuk framework and invited him to the upcoming Annual Meetings of the Bank slated for mid-June 2021 in Tashkent, Uzbekistan.

Some other country platforms that IsDB is building such as ‘the regional infrastructure supranational entities’, ‘the global value chains-based country programs’, and ‘the IsDB blockchain-based global coordination platform’ used as a COVID-19 response tool were amongst other issues that were highlighted during the discussions at the meeting.   

Elsewhere in his remarks, Dr. Hajjar emphasized on employing innovation in the service of the developing countries and also underscored the Bank’s readiness to provide advisory and share experience in issuing Shari’ah-compliant financing instruments geared towards development and the achievement of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

He also touched on IsDB’s experience in facilitating sharing of knowledge and expertise among Member Countries through its Reverse Linkage, a capacity sharing platform adopted by the Bank as a suitable mechanism for cooperation among South-South Countries.

Mr. Liquin, for his part, commended the progress that IsDB has pulled off in various sectors in its Member Countries and expressed hope that the two development partners can accomplish even greater achievements in the future based on advancing their ongoing cooperation.