Bhutan's outstanding external debt at Nu 184B | #AsiaNewsNetwork

Bhutan's outstanding external debt at Nu 184B | #AsiaNewsNetwork
Published 14 May 2019
Tshering Dorji

Thimphu (Kuensel) - Bhutan’s total outstanding external debt has increased to Nu 184 billion (B) this March from Nu 172B in March last year, on account of increased hydropower loan and RBI swap facility.

According to the Royal Monetary Authority’s (RMA) statistical bulletin, rupee debt alone constitutes more than 74 percent of the total debt at Nu 136B. This is also an increase by about Nu 10B compared with March last year. The remaining Nu 47B is convertible currency debt.

While the non-hydro debt portfolio is below 35 in keeping with national debt management policy, hydro loan are claimed to be self-liquidating. However, because of the significant amount of hydropower loan, the country’s debt to GDP ratio is recorded at 111 percent.

This means that the country’s debt size is more than double the size of its economy size, making Bhutan highly indebted.

Of the total rupee debt, Nu 122B or about 90 percent is hydropower debt.

Figures from the RMA show that Punatshangchhu I has an outstanding debt of Nu 46B and Punatshangchu II has Nu 40B. Mangdechhu project has accrued a total loan Nu 34B. Nikachhu’s loan also increased from Nu 737M in March last year to Nu 1.55B this year. These figures are excluding the accrued interest.

However, Tala project’s loan was liquidated since December last year.

The country also has an outstanding loan of Nu 7B availed from GoI line of credit and another Nu 7.1B from RBI swap facility.

Bhutan owes Nu 129B to the government of India, which constitutes 95 percent of the total rupee debt.

As for the convertible loans, of the Nu 47B, more than 40 percent, around Nu 19.7B was borrowed from the Asian Development Bank and another Nu 16.7 from the World Bank. The remaining is from JICA, government of Austria and IFAD.

These loans pertain to urban development project, commercialisation of agriculture, rural electrification, green power development, fiscal management and private sector development among others.

http://www.kuenselonline.com/outstanding-external-debt-at-nu-184b/