The president of the US agency Millennium Challenge Corporation (MCC), Alice Albright, said yesterday that the donation of 500 million dollars for coastal connectivity and resilience projects represents a "landmark moment" in relations with Mozambique.

The Mozambican government, represented by the President of the Republic, Filipe Nyusi, and the Minister of Economy and Finance, Max Tonela, signed the second financing compact for Mozambique with the US agency yesterday on Capitol Hill in Washington.

"We are going to help an estimated 15 million Mozambicans over the next 20 years in various aspects of daily life. We're going to help recover fisheries, transportation, agriculture, youth and women," said Alice Albright, quoted by Lusa.

The Mozambique Coastal Connectivity and Resilience project, financed to the tune of 500 million dollars by the US government, to which the Mozambican government is contributing 37.5 million dollars, focuses on improving transport networks in rural areas.

According to the MCC, the funding will also encourage commercial agriculture through political and fiscal reforms and improve coastal livelihoods through climate resilience initiatives in Zambezia province.

"The MCC is very selective about the countries it works with. We work with countries that are democracies, that seek to invest in people and improve their economies, and that's why it's a landmark moment in relations between the two countries for us to start this Compact," he explained, speaking to journalists after the signing of the agreement, which was attended by the Mozambican Head of State, Filipe Nyusi.

"The United States is incredibly proud of the relationship it has with Mozambique and my agency, which is part of the US government, is deeply honored to be able to sign our second agreement with Mozambique (...) we started our first agreement in 2004 and we will work on the second agreement in several areas, to help the country with some of the impacts of the climate," added the MCC president.

The Minister of Economy and Finance, Max Tonela, said that the signing of this financing agreement was "a new milestone in the excellent relations between Mozambique and the United States".

"It's an initiative that will help speed up Mozambique's development process, stimulate an increase in employment and production and the well-being of the population (...) It will have an impact on the whole country, since most of the investment will be made in road infrastructure. We will have more than 200 kilometers of roads in the central region, including the links between Zambézia and Niassa, and the secondary roads," said Max Tonela.

Following the signing of this agreement, the MCC Mozambique will be set up, which will be jointly managed by the governments of the two countries and will be responsible for implementing the projects.

"The next steps will be the disbursement of the first funds, around 50 million US dollars, with today's signature. This will make it possible to finance the technical work, which should take place over the next few months," he told reporters.

Overall, through this funding, the MCC is allocating 310.5 million dollars to Connectivity and Rural Transport (CTR) projects, including the bridge over the Licungo river and the construction of the Mocuba bypass, a project valued at 201 million dollars.

Almost 83.5 million dollars are earmarked for the construction of rural roads and 11 million dollars for road maintenance, among other things.

The Reforms and Investment in Agricultural Projects (PRIA) component has been allocated 30 million dollars, half of which is for the Agricultural Investment Tax reform package and the other half for setting up the Zambézia Province Commercial Aggregation Platform.

The third structural component, worth 100 million dollars, is aimed at Coastal Livelihood and Climate Resilience (CLCR) projects to strengthen productivity "through sustainable increases in fish and shellfish harvesting and through non-extractive activities", but also using "sustainable ecosystem benefits, such as carbon credits and coastal protection benefits".

This is MCC's second financing compact with Mozambique, following another worth 506.9 million dollars, concluded in 2013, which focused on water supply and sanitation, land ownership issues, transportation and agriculture.