Resources running out: African Development Bank chief

By Lesley Wroughton

ISTANBUL (Reuters) - The African Development Bank has sped up its lending to the region's 38 poorest countries in response to the downturn in the global economy and will run out of resources by the end of 2010, its president, Donald Kaberuka, says.

"The discussion here is can we replenish the cycles earlier because we will be running out of money by 2010," he said in an interview with Reuters on the sidelines of the International Monetary Fund and World Bank meetings here.

"We have front-loaded about 82 percent of all of our concessional window," for the poorest countries, he added.

Africa's poorest countries, many of them emerging from conflict, were vulnerable before the global economic downturn erupted in 2008, having just weathered a world food and energy crisis in 2007.

"Next year for poorer countries we will be having $1 billion. By end of 2010 we absolutely need to have fresh concessional resources for them," said Kaberuka.

The world's regional development banks and the World Bank are preparing to present their case for more resources to major donor countries early next year.

This week, World Bank President Robert Zoellick warned the bank's 186 shareholder nations in Istanbul that while there were some signs of a global economic recovery, the global crisis was far from over in developing countries.

He said in many parts of the developing world, governments were only now feeling the full force of the global crisis, which could quickly return to advanced economies where it began.