11.02.2014, Jeddah, KSA – Islamic Development Bank (IDB) Group’s Arab member countries are to meet in a High Level Regional Forum on 11-12 February, 2014, in Jeddah, Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, in preparation for the Bank’s 40th year celebration which will take place concurrently with the 39th Annual Meeting of the Bank’s Board of Governors in June 2014.

The main event (on 12 February) is to be inaugurated by the Finance Minister of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, HE Dr. Ibrahim al-Assaf, at IDB headquarters and is expected to review IDB Group’s achievements in the past 40 years while discussing the future challenges and contributing to drawing up the Group’ s new strategy for the next ten years.

The event comes in the wake of three earlier similar regional fora organized by the IDB Group in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia; Almaty, Kazakhstan; and Dakar, Senegal, and will be attended by finance ministers and IDB Governors of the Arab member countries, Members of the Boards of IDB Group entities from Arab member countries as well as development experts and stake-holders in addition to Media representatives.

Since its inception in 1975 to date, the IDB Group financing has exceeded US$ 100 billion including US$ 38.6 billion to Arab countries for 2865 operations (until November 2013) inclusive of all socio-economic development projects.