Bekasi water company seeks private investors
Bekasi water company seeks private investors
BEKASI, West Java (JP): The Bekasi administration-owned water
company, PDAM, is inviting private companies to help multiply its
production capacity to 5,000 liters of water per second from the
current level of 1,000 liters under a joint-operation scheme.
"We need a total investment of Rp 500 billion (US$211.8
million) for the expansion project, which is slated to start in
2000," the firm's chief executive, Dudung T. Ruskandi, said.
He said the investment is required for establishing new water-
processing terminals and new pipeline-distribution networks.
"We welcome any corporations interested in conducting
feasibility studies prior to the establishment of a joint-
operation business with us," he told The Jakarta Post in a recent
interview.
Dudung said the planned joint operations will be based on a
25-year contract in accordance with the Minister of Home Affairs'
Decree No. 04/1990 and Decree No. 20/1996.
He said that the joint-operation plans have been approved by
the West Java governor and the Bekasi regent.
"We will provide land for prospective joint-operation
projects," he noted.
PDAM currently supplies clean water to 32,000 customers in 16
of Bekasi's 23 districts. The customers represent about 160,000
people or only 5.3 percent of Bekasi's population of three
million.
Dudung said that in line with the local administration's
target, his firm should increase the number of its customers to
60,000 after the completion of the expansion project.
The demand for clean water has been increasing steadily in
Bekasi since six years ago due to increases in the establishment
of new housing complexes and industrial estates.
The administration's data show that Bekasi, whose population
growth reaches 6.5 percent per annum, currently has 300 housing
complexes and 15 industrial estates.
Dudung said that his company cannot raise new loans at present
because it has accrued large amounts of loans over the past
years.
In 1990/1991, for example, the company obtained a Rp 4.6-
billion loan from the government for a water installation
project. Last year, the company also raised a loan of $11 million
from the Asian Development Bank and Rp 5.14 billion from the
government,
The loan from the Asian Development Bank carries an interest
rate of 11 percent per annum, Dudung said. (kod)