AR CRL1 APL1 Buenos Aires Infrastructure

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The overall purpose of the Program is to improve the provision of infrastructure services in the Province of Buenos Aires, within a framework of fiscal responsibility as a means of supporting the return to a sustainable path of economic growth, to alleviate poverty, and increase social equity. To this end, the Province is prioritizing a set of interventions under the infrastructure Program for the period 2005-2010. Specifically, project components include: 1) Roads component will support: a) a road rehabilitation program for the provincial primary paved network (interurban, and urban within the Greater Metropolitan Area of Buenos Aires - CB -) that aims at gradually achieving a steady-state condition; b) the rehabilitation of access roads to some ports and localities; and, c) the removal of selected bottlenecks, widening some sections of the primary network within the CB, and enhancing intersections in high-traffic roads, all of which must comply with the agreed eligibility criteria. 2) The water and sewerage component will expand the provision of services towards areas of low income, and high vulnerability, many of them located within the Greater Metropolitan Area of Buenos Aires, financing mostly secondary sewerage systems that take advantage of existing primary facilities. 3) The drainage component will finance a series of drainage subprojects in urban, and peri-urban areas, mostly storm sewers in the CB, that comply with the agreed eligibility criteria. 4) The technical Assistance component aims to: a) strengthen the institutional capacity in the public entities involved in Project execution, and other entities dealing with policy design, planning, regulation and control of infrastructure services; and, b) build-up a strategic framework to facilitate economic development, competitiveness, and foster employment, based on which the provincial authorities would set guidelines on sector, and territorial development, design infrastructure policies, and orient investment decision-making within the Province.