Early Warning System

Regions

East Asia and Pacific

Geographic location where the impacts of the investment may be experienced.

Countries

Vietnam

Geographic location where the impacts of the investment may be experienced.

Financial Institutions

US International Development Finance Corporation (DFC)

International, regional and national development finance institutions. Many of these banks have a public interest mission, such as poverty reduction.

Project Status

Approved

Stage of the project cycle. Stages vary by development bank and can include: pending, approval, implementation, and closed or completed.

Bank Risk Rating

Environmental and social categorization assessed by the development bank as a measure of the planned project’s environmental and social impacts. A higher risk rating may require more due diligence to limit or avoid harm to people and the environment. For example, "A" or "B" are risk categories where "A" represents the highest amount of risk. Results will include projects that specifically recorded a rating, all other projects are marked ‘U’ for "Undisclosed."

Borrower

BuyMed Pte. Ltd.

A public entity (government or state-owned) provided with funds or financial support to manage and/or implement a project.

Sectors

Education and Health
Industry and Trade

The service or industry focus of the investment. A project can have several sectors.

Investment Amount (USD)

$ 18.00 million

Value listed on project documents at time of disclosure. If necessary, this amount is converted to USD ($) on the date of disclosure. Please review updated project documents for more information.

Project Cost (USD)

$ 51.50 million

Value listed on project documents at time of disclosure. If necessary, this amount is converted to USD ($) on the date of disclosure. Please review updated project documents for more information.

Bank Documents

Project Disclosure

Primary Source

Original disclosure @ DFC website

Updated in EWS Mar 28, 2024

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Project Description

If provided by the financial institution, the Early Warning System Team writes a short summary describing the purported development objective of the project and project components. Review the complete project documentation for a detailed description.

According to the DFC, the investment is expected to have a positive development impact in Vietnam by improving the efficiency and quality of pharmaceutical distribution, particularly in rural and other underserved areas.
The pharmaceutical distribution market in Vietnam is fragmented and inefficient, leading to limited availability of a wide range of drugs for consumers - especially in rural areas - and the introduction of counterfeit drugs into the supply chain.
The Project Company’s innovative distribution platform provides a simple and direct way for pharmacies across the country, nearly all of which are small independent operations, to quickly and directly access a wide variety of drugs and care products, including hard-to-access medications. This enables end consumers, most of whom are in rural areas, to obtain a range of high-quality pharmaceuticals.

Investment Description

Here you can find a list of individual development financial institutions that finance the project.

US International Development Finance Corporation (DFC)

The type of investment was not specified by the DFC in the project disclosure.

Private Actors Description

A Private Actor is a non-governmental body or entity that is the borrower or client of a development project, which can include corporations, private equity and banks. This describes the private actors and their roles in relation to the project, when private actor information is disclosed or has been further researched.

As stated by the DFC, Buymed is a technology-enabled business-to-business healthcare company that allows pharmacies, clinics, and hospitals to procure a variety of pharmaceutical products.

Private Actor 1	Private Actor 1 Role	Private Actor 1 Sector	Relation	Private Actor 2	Private Actor 2 Role	Private Actor 2 Sector
-	-	-	-	BuyMed Pte. Ltd.	Client	Education and Health

Contact Information

This section aims to support the local communities and local CSO to get to know which stakeholders are involved in a project with their roles and responsibilities. If available, there may be a complaint office for the respective bank which operates independently to receive and determine violations in policy and practice. Independent Accountability Mechanisms receive and respond to complaints. Most Independent Accountability Mechanisms offer two functions for addressing complaints: dispute resolution and compliance review.

No project contacts provided at the time of disclosure.

Client - BuyMed Pte. Ltd.:

Website: https://www.buymed.co.th/home

ACCESS TO INFORMATION

Unlike many other development finance institutions, DFC does not currently have an access to information policy.

Under the United States Freedom of Information Act (FOIA), DFC is obliged to respond to reasonably formulated requests for Agency records. However, DFC may apply exemptions from release to certain types of information and may charge fees in responding to requests. DFC has a designated FOIA officer who is trained in how to respond to requests and implement the law. You can learn more about filing a FOIA request at: https://www.dfc.gov/foia

ACCOUNTABILITY MECHANISM OF THE UNITED STATES INTERNATIONAL DEVELOPMENT FINANCE CORPORATION (DFC)

The Office of Accountability is an independent office that addresses complaints about environmental or social issues related to DFC-supported projects. The office provides communities an opportunity to have concerns independently reviewed and addressed. If you submit a complaint to the Office of Accountability, it may assist you by either seeking to address your problems by facilitating a problem solving dialogue between you and those implementing the project and/or investigating whether the DFC complied with its policies to prevent environmental, social, human rights, and labor harms.

You can find more information about the Office of Accountability at: https://www.dfc.gov/who-we-are/office-accountability