Dar to host PTA bank board meeting

By The guardian reporter

  Annual growth leaps to 30 pct, balance sheet now USD2.8bn

Minister of finance, Saada Mkuya.

Tanzania will host the PTA Bank Board of Governors (BoG) 30th annual meeting this Friday and subsequently take over chairmanship of the continent’s biggest bank for the 2014/15 period.

 

Before the meeting that will be held at the Julius Nyerere International Conference Centre (JNICC) in Dar es Salaam, there will be a one-day business seminar on August 21, a press statement issued at the weekend said.

 

The Eastern and Southern African Trade and Development Bank (PTA Bank) is a well established and high performing regional development financial institution, providing a blend of trade, infrastructure and enterprise finance within the country and among the preferential trade area member states.  

 

The bank provides developmental capital and financial services through customer focused and innovative financing instruments. 

 

Currently, it has a balance sheet of USD2.8bn and is among the largest regional development banks in Africa.  

 

The bank has been growing at about 30 per cent per annum for several years, with healthy profits and low levels of non-performing loans. 

 

PTA Bank has been very active in Tanzania, working in partnership with local, regional and global financiers. 

 

Working with CRDB Bank and the Ministry of Finance, PTA has supported state-owned enterprises such as the Tanzania Ports Authority and Tanzania Electricity Supply Company Limited (Tanesco) in the expansion of infrastructures across the country.  

 

The bank has co-financed the replacement of the single-point mooring and pipeline system at Tanzania Ports Authority, which supports the movement of essential and other goods to and from Burundi, DRC, Zambia and Rwanda.  

 

Additionally, PTA Bank has facilitated financing of telecommunication and tourism projects in Arusha and Zanzibar.

 

The bank’s international credit ratings were upgraded in 2013 by Fitch Ratings, and the year before, by Global Credit Rating (GCR), South Africa.  

 

PTA is among the few African financial institutions that successfully issues bonds in the African and European capital markets and enjoys funding lines from over 30 financial institutions in Africa, Europe, Asia and North America.

 

Established in 1985, PTA Bank is a multilateral African financial institution that is based on a treaty with a total of 22 shareholders, 18 of which are member countries from the tripartite region (Comesa, EAC and SADC), the People’s Republic of China, the African Development Bank, the National Pension Fund (Mauritius), Mauritian Eagle Insurance and Paritetbank (Belarus).    

 

 The bank was established as an international organisation on November 6, 1985 pursuant to the provisions of Chapter 9 of the Treaty (1981) establishing the Preferential Trade Area for the Eastern and Southern African States (PTA) which was later transformed into the Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa (Comesa). 

 

“The bank aims to be a leading specialised financial institution in Eastern and Southern Africa,” reads part of the bank’s released press statement.

 

SOURCE: THE GUARDIAN