The departmental administration of Córdoba would be evaluating the possibility of requesting a loan for an unconfirmed value, but which could be greater than 200,000 million. of pesos to leverage the projects and works included in its development plan, according to sources consulted by LARAZÓN.CO.
According to the information collected, this strategy arises due to the difficulties that the department has had in accessing resources from the National Government due to the low execution of budgets in ministerial portfolios, which has delayed several planned projects.
Although Governor Erasmo Zuleta has not confirmed the exact amount of the loan to be requested, on previous occasions he has stated that they cannot sit idly waiting for resources from the central level, and that they must begin to materialize the works with the resources that the department currently has, whether through royalties or current freely-destined taxes.
It should be noted that Córdoba has resorted to loans in the past to leverage some of its projects, registering operations for values ranging between 30,000 and 76,500 million pesos between 2017 and 2022.
According to the information obtained, the government would be waiting for the results of the risk rating agencies, in order to choose the banking institution that offers the best conditions, that is, a lower interest rate and greater benefits.
It is important to mention that the municipality of Montería has been a pioneer in this strategy, achieving credit disbursements for nearly 200,000 million pesos, with which several works contemplated in their development plan have begun to be executed.
Additionally, other financing options are evaluated, such as Fonpet’s dissaving resources, whose decreasing trend in real terms suggests a decrease in the department’s savings capacity or lower availability of resources for this purpose.
According to the departmental development plan, Córdoba’s income has grown on average 3.9% annually, reaching 320.2 billion pesos in 2022, and although the transfers from the nation have increased 35.1% from 2017 to 2022, reaching 59,799 million pesos in that period, they are still insignificant.
