Colombia - Resilient and Sustainable Infrastructure for Recovery Development Policy Financing Project

The Resilient and Sustainable Infrastructure for Recovery Development Policy Financing (DPF) in the amount of USD500 million for the Republic of Colombia is the first of a series of two programmatic DPFs. The series aims to support the Government of Colombia (GoC) in its efforts to sustain access to critical infrastructure services for firms and households following the COVID-19 crisis, while establishing the policy foundations for recovery through sustainable and resilient infrastructure. In response to the COVID-19 crisis pandemic, Colombia declared a national health emergency on March 12, 2020 and imposed a national quarantine and lockdown on March 16, 2020. The GoC then rapidly rolled out a broad program of emergency public health, social protection, and economic-fiscal measures to save lives, protect the poor and sustain firms. The program focused on four areas: (i) ensuring fiscal space for the response; (ii) supporting the capacity of the health system; (iii) providing income and nutrition support to poor and vulnerable households; and (iv) maintaining liquidity and access to finance for firms, including utilities. This DPF series follows the World Bank-financed ’COVID-19 Crisis Response DPF, approved on June 26, 2020, which supported Colombia’s broad program of critical initial emergency measures to save lives and protect the poor and vulnerable in the immediate aftermath of COVID-19. This DP series supports the next stage of Colombia’s COVID-19 response: (a) reactivating and securing the economy; and (b) promoting a recovery that is both resilient and sustainable.