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On April 20, Jaime Elizondo, President of CEMEX Mexico, and Luiz Ros, Manager of the Opportunities for the Majority initiative of the Inter-American Development Bank, signed a partial credit guarantee agreement that will enable CEMEX to significantly increase the scope of its Mejora Tu Calle (“Improve Your Street”) program.
Mejora Tu Calle accelerates access to pavement in low-income urban communities, through partnerships with municipal authorities and neighborhood residents. This is the first community infrastructure project to receive support from IDB’s Opportunities for the Majority. The US$10 million contribution will serve to partially guarantee the financing that CEMEX provides to individual beneficiaries to cover a portion of the paving costs, and will enable the company to extend the program to a larger number of families.
“Mejora Tu Calle brings together the private and public sectors in an innovative way. With the IDB’s involvement, we can make the program more attractive to both the authorities and the beneficiaries. This is a reaffirmation of our commitment to contribute to the development of low-income sectors in the country,” explains CEMEX president Jaime Elizondo,
“In our first stage, we expect to pave 1.5 million square meters and benefit over 35,000 low-income Mexican families. Our goal is to extend the program until we are able to pave about 8 million square meters, which would benefit 160,000 families,” Elizondo added.
Mejora Tu Calle is showing a strong record so far. In a pilot phase, CEMEX completed over 300,000 square meters of pavement in five states across Mexico. Thanks to this effort, over 6,000 families now have paved streets in their neighborhoods.
Luiz Ros, Manager of Opportunities for the Majority, explains: “The benefits of the project are threefold, and extend beyond pavement. First, it improves the value of the communities’ economic assets, since estimates show that pavement increases property values by over 30%. Second, it improves the provision of basic municipal services; and third, it reduces air pollution and the incidence of respiratory illnesses and other health problems.”
Additionally, the IDB is providing a non-reimbursable contribution of US$250,000 for the implementation of best practices at the municipal level.
