MCC Chief Operating Officer to visit Kosovo to launch new $49 million program

Millennium Challenge Corporation (MCC) Chief Operating Officer Jonathan Nash is visiting Kosovo alongside U.S. Congressman Eliot Engel of New York for the launch of MCC’s $49 million Kosovo Threshold Program signed in September.

MCC’s implementing partner, the Millennium Foundation Kosovo, will host a one-day conference to kick off the program, which is designed to drive economic growth and reduce poverty across the country. Kosovo Prime Minister HE Ramush Haradinaj will open the event, and COO Nash and Congressman Engel will deliver keynote remarks highlighting U.S.-Kosovo relations nearly 10 years after Kosovo’s independence, and opportunities presented by the new threshold program.

Kosovo is one of the newest countries in the world, and with 30 percent of the population living below the poverty line, it is also one of the poorest countries in Europe. Since gaining its independence in 2008, Kosovo continues to develop government institutions that can deliver critical services to its citizens.

MCC’s Kosovo Threshold Program supports the Government’s efforts to lower energy costs for households and businesses and improve transparency and accountability with a focus on policy and institutional reforms. Economic analysis identified a lack of reliable electricity and real and perceived weaknesses in rule of law as two critical constraints to growth in Kosovo.

The threshold program is MCC’s smaller grant program focused on advancing policy and institutional reform that helps partner countries better serve their people. MCC’s grant investments promote economic growth and help people lift themselves out of poverty, creating more stable, secure countries and new business opportunities.

Original source: MCC
Published on 20 November 2017