The World Bank
   Liberia Youth Opportunities Project (P146827)




                                                                                     REPORT NO.: RES42514

                                     DOCUMENT OF THE WORLD BANK




                                         RESTRUCTURING PAPER
                                                   ON A
                                   PROPOSED PROJECT RESTRUCTURING

                                                      OF

                                LIBERIA YOUTH OPPORTUNITIES PROJECT
                                   APPROVED ON NOVEMBER 6, 2015
                                                      TO

                                          REPUBLIC OF LIBERIA


SOCIAL PROTECTION & JOBS

AFRICA WEST




                           Regional Vice President:    Hafez M. H. Ghanem
                                 Country Director:     Pierre Frank Laporte
                                 Regional Director:    Amit Dar
                       Practice Manager/Manager:       Iffath Anwar Sharif
                              Task Team Leader(s):     Mack Capehart Mulbah, Victoria Strokova
           The World Bank
           Liberia Youth Opportunities Project (P146827)



I. BASIC DATA

Product Information

Project ID                                                    Financing Instrument
P146827                                                       Investment Project Financing

Original EA Category                                          Current EA Category
Partial Assessment (B)                                        Partial Assessment (B)

Approval Date                                                 Current Closing Date
06-Nov-2015                                                   30-Jun-2021




Organizations

Borrower                                                      Responsible Agency
                                                              Ministry of Youth and Sports,Liberia Agency for
Republic of Liberia
                                                              Community Empowerment



Project Development Objective (PDO)
Original PDO
The Project Development Objectives are to improve access to income generation opportunities for targeted youth and
strengthen the government' capacity to implement its cash transfer program.

Current PDO
To improve access to income generation opportunities for targeted youth.

Summary Status of Financing


                                                                                      Net
Ln/Cr/Tf                  Approval         Signing Effectiveness       Closing Commitment Disbursed Undisbursed

IDA-56210             06-Nov-2015     24-Feb-2016   30-Sep-2016    30-Jun-2021          10.00       7.93        2.11
TF-A9505              29-Mar-2019     09-Apr-2019    29-Jun-2019 31-Dec-2020             1.53       1.50         .03
           The World Bank
           Liberia Youth Opportunities Project (P146827)



Policy Waiver(s)

Does this restructuring trigger the need for any policy waiver(s)?
No


I. SUMMARY OF PROJECT STATUS AND PROPOSED CHANGES

 The Youth Opportunities Project (YOP) was approved by the Board of Directors on November 6, 2015. YOP’s Project
 Development Objective (PDO) is to improve access to income generation opportunities for targeted youth. The Project
 became effective on September 30, 2016 and was officially launched on January 9, 2017. YOP is financed by US$10
 million IDA credit. An additional financing (AF) from the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency
 (Sida) totaling US$3.5 million was approved by the Bank’s Management on March 28, 2019. Out of this amount,
 approximately US$1.5 million was made available immediately based on the first tranche received from Sida in
 December 2018. The Grant Agreement for TF0A9505 (“Additional Financing for Youth Opportunities Project”) for this
 initial US$1.5 million was signed on April 9, 2019, and became effective on June 29, 2019. The IDA project was recently
 restructured to, among others, extend the closing date from December 31, 2020, to June 30, 2021.

 Overall project implementation continues to be Moderately Satisfactory. After initial delays, the overall disbursement
 rate has increased to 81.5 percent by June 2020. The project has almost fully disbursed the first tranche of the Sida
 grant. The project is largely on track to meet its development objective. Discussions are ongoing with the
 implementation agencies (Ministry of Youth and Sports and Liberia Agency for Community Empowerment) on how
 implementation of some of the activities needs to be adjusted considering the challenges presented by COVID-19
 pandemic. There are no overdue audit reports from the Recipient.
 The proposed restructuring aims to: i) change the closing date of the Sida financed RETF (TF0A9505), from December
 30, 2020, to June 31, 2021, in line with the new project closing date - this will be the first extension for six months; and
 ii) allocate the remainder of the AF (approximately US$2 million) from the Sida TF, which is now available for
 disbursement and for which an amendment to the Grant Agreement is required. The end-disbursement date for the
 Administrative Agreement for the Trustee Account (TF073223 “Liberia Improving Access to Income Generation
 Opportunities for Youth Multi-Donor Trust Fund”) with Sida was recently changed to June 30, 2022.




II. DETAILED CHANGES


LOAN CLOSING DATE(S)


                                          Original                 Revised                Proposed       Proposed Deadline
Ln/Cr/Tf         Status                   Closing                Closing(s)                 Closing         for Withdrawal
                                                                                                               Applications
IDA-56210        Effective           31-Dec-2020              30-Jun-2021
TF-A9505         Effective           31-Dec-2020                                       30-Jun-2021              30-Oct-2021
The World Bank
Liberia Youth Opportunities Project (P146827)