PESHAWAR: A memorandum of understanding (MoU) was signed between the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Health Department and the Kreditanstalt für Wiederaufbau (KfW), a German development bank, regarding the second phase of the Safe Blood Transfusion Programme.
The memorandum was signed by Health Secretary Mohammad Abid Majeed and KfW Project Coordinator Dr Masooma Zaidi in a ceremony held here in the Health Secretariat in the presence of Senior Minister for Health Shahram Tarakai.
According to the memorandum, the German bank will provide financial assistance for the establishment of regional blood centres in the province with a capacity of up to 20,000 blood donations per year while the health department will act as the project executing agency.
The KfW bank will also provide assistance for the procurement of medical laboratory equipment in those blood centres and in additional 12 hospitals based blood bank. Other areas of the financial assistance include waste management and disposal system, the Management Information System (MIS), technical and management training for the centres and the hospitals based banks, equipment maintenance, consultancy services etc.
The project will cost approximately 4.42 million euro out of which the KfW contribution will be of 3.41 million euro. The time schedule for the preparation, implementation and operation of the project is 36 months from the date of the signing of the agreement.
Being the project executing agency, the health department shall be responsible for the overall supervision of the project through a project monitoring unit. It will notify a construction tender committee, launch the tender, endorse the tender evaluation report, sign contracts and approve payments to the contractors for the construction of the regional centres and nominate an authorised representative who shall be responsible for the overall project implementation and cooperation with the KfW.
Speaking on the occasion, Minister Tarakai termed the MoU as a milestone achieved in the safe transfusion of blood, saying the project when completed would regulate blood transfusion, ensure safe blood to the needy ones and thus help save precious human lives. He appreciated the KfW for its cooperation for improving healthcare service delivery in the province.
