Today session No. 66 of OCAD Paz was held, in which 55 projects were approved that will be financed by the allocation of incentives to the production of royalties, for a value of $163,197 million and will benefit more than 500,000 inhabitants of 16 departments from the country. With these, there are already 58 projects approved during the government of President Gustavo Petro for a value of more than $170 billion in royalties.
The session chaired by Gloria Cuartas, director of the Peace Agreement Implementation Unit (UIAP), was attended by the mayors of the municipalities of Morelia (Caquetá) and Montelíbano (Córdoba), as well as the governors of Huila and Norte de Santander as new members delegated to OCAD Paz.
This progress means the development of strategic projects in multiple sectors such as energy, agriculture, environment, education, risk management, transportation, housing, and social inclusion and reconciliation, among others. In the mining-energy sector, for example, alternative energy projects may be launched for the benefit of 8,000 Colombian men and women. Likewise, within what was approved, there are proposals to bring home gas to 13,000 people and connect 3,000 more with electrification network projects.
Nine adjustments to investment projects that respond to changes that have occurred during the execution stages were also approved, and the release of resources for three projects was reported, in which contracting processes were not opened within the defined terms. After this decision, resources of 2,203 million will be released, which will be useful to finance other projects.
This government receives $1.6 billion less in OCAD Paz, which was advanced by the government of Iván Duque for the four-year period 2023-2026 ($400 billion for each year). Today there are $2 trillion of the $2.8 that were projected for the years 2023-2024.
Among the beneficiaries of the approved projects are rural communities linked to the PDETs in six (6) subregions affected by violence and poverty in the country with 13 projects worth $43 billion.
By investment sectors, the highest category corresponds to mining and energy (22 projects for $76 billion), followed by transportation (11 projects for $50 billion), housing, city and territory (10 projects for $18 billion, and education (6 projects for $9 billion) It is worth mentioning the approval of the project to update the physical, legal and economic property information of urban areas, and the expansion zone of Yopal, capital of the department of Casanare, with a multipurpose approach.
The departments of the populations benefited are Meta; Bolívar; Casanare; Tolima; Putumayo; Huíla; collided; La Guajira; Santander; Cease; Sucre; Narino; Boyacá; Antioch; Cordoba and North Santander.
In the OCAD Peace session, the new members were presented with the methodological proposal with the criteria for prioritizing projects from the sources of Assignment for Peace and Debt of the National Pension Fund of Territorial Entities (FONPET).
At the end of the session, the Deputy Director General of Royalties of the DNP, Tania Guzmán, stated: “It is essential that the new members of OCAD Paz review the project prioritization proposal built jointly between National Planning and the Territory Renewal Agency to define some rules more equitable distribution of the royalties destined for the implementation of the Peace Agreement”.
It should be noted that the National Planning Department does not approve or execute resources from the General Royalty System in any of its instances, but rather exercises a role as technical secretary to manage information and verify project requirements, among other tasks.
The main purpose of Planeación is that the royalties resources serve to promote greater regional development and a closing of the gaps between territories, for which it is developing a new comprehensive technical assistance model to strengthen the execution capacities in the regions helping to that municipalities improve their capacities to access system resources.
Source: National Planning Department