![AFD's action in Ecuador, development projects](/sites/afd/files/styles/visuel_principal/public/2021-04-11-55-50/enfants-filles-education-equateur-ministere-education.jpg?itok=Lz9Qh82c)
Ecuador
![AFD's action in Ecuador, development projects](/sites/afd/files/styles/visuel_principal/public/2021-04-11-55-50/enfants-filles-education-equateur-ministere-education.jpg?itok=Lz9Qh82c)
![Cotopoxi, Ecuador, mountain, Matzinger, Neck of the moon](/sites/afd/files/styles/bloc_bleu/public/2017-08/Equateur-Cotopaxi-montagne-paysage-Simon-Matzinger-flickr.jpg?itok=-x_CJVN_)
- Increasing access to water and sanitation
- Ensuring the access to quality education for all
- Post-hearthquake rebuilding
- Developing more reliable and greener energy
- Promoting sustainable development
- Supporting civil society action
Increasing access to water and sanitation
Ensuring the access to quality education for all
Post-hearthquake rebuilding
Developing more reliable and greener energy
Promoting sustainable development
Supporting civil society action
Ecuador is located between Colombia and Peru and bordered by the Pacific. Up until 2014, it was one of the most dynamic countries in Latin America with strong growth, in particular driven by public investments, which were themselves financed by oil revenues. Thanks to the dollarization of its economy in 2000, the country has achieved its macroeconomic stabilization and engaged in its structural transformation, which is marked by dynamic public action in both the infrastructure sector – with a focus on energy infrastructure to reduce its dependence on oil – and in the social, education and health sectors.
However, this progress is today threatened by the fall in oil prices and the value of the US dollar. The massive earthquake in April 2016 also compounded the country’s situation. The country faces major challenges, particularly in the sectors of water and sanitation, education, agriculture, gender equality and the fight against climate change.
Ecuador has an exceptional natural heritage and is one of the world’s biodiversity hotspots. This wealth needs to be preserved: the 2008 Constitution consequently gives rights to nature via the concept of “buen vivir” (“living well”) and focuses on development choices in harmony with the environment, citizen participation and the equitable distribution of wealth.
AFD has been operating in Ecuador since 2015 and has committed USD 560m via six loans to public entities in the water and sanitation, energy, post-earthquake reconstruction, education and transport sectors. It has also mobilized EUR 10m in the form of European Union LAIF grants. In addition, it took action, on an exceptional basis, following the earthquake in 2016 in order to respond to the emergency.
AFD's Ecuador office is directly attached to the Andes regional office in Bogotá.