AKIPRESS.COM - President of the Asian Development Bank Takehiko Nakao will pay a 3-day visit to Tajikistan to meet with Tajik officials and attend the 16th Ministerial Conference of the Central Asia Regional Economic Cooperation (CAREC), the ADB reports.

Mr. Nakao will deliver a speech at the 16th CAREC Ministerial Conference in Dushanbe on October 27.

The Conference will be held under the chairmanship of the Minister of Economic Development and Trade of Tajikistan Negmatullo Hikmatullozoda.

CAREC is an ADB-supported initiative to encourage economic cooperation in Central Asia. Initiated in 1997, the program to date has focused on regional initiatives in transport, trade facilitation, trade policy, and energy critical to improving the economic performance of the region and the livelihoods of all people, especially of the poor.

Mr. Nakao was first elected as President by the Board of Governors on 28 April, 2013 to serve the 3 and a half years remaining of the term of his predecessor, Haruhiko Kuroda. Mr. Nakao is the ninth President of ADB. On August 5, 2016, the Asian Development Bank Board of Governors unanimously reelected Takehiko Nakao as President of ADB for a further 5 years.