RI needs less financial aid from donor group
RI needs less financial aid from donor group
JAKARTA (JP): The government will propose financial aid from the Consultative Group for Indonesia (CGI) in the middle of this year for the construction of 651 development projects worth US$20.1 billion, fewer than the 686 projects worth $22.5 billion proposed in 1995.
A deputy chairman of the National Development Planning Board, Rahardi Ramelan, told a press conference here yesterday that Indonesia plans to ask for $16.01 billion worth of assistance from the CGI donor members, to partly finance the proposed projects, which are listed in the government's Blue Book.
"Last year we asked for $17.6 billion in soft loans and grants," he said.
The World Bank-chaired CGI committed itself last year to extend $5.36 billion worth of aid to Indonesia, which indicated a small increase from the $5.2 billion pledged in 1994.
CGI was set up in 1992 after the Inter-Governmental Group on Indonesia (IGGI), a donor group coordinated by the Dutch government, was dissolved due to Indonesia's disillusionment with what it saw as the Netherlands' persistent interference in its domestic affairs.
Rahardi said that out of this year's 651 total proposed projects, 306 are expected to get project assistance and the other 345 need technical assistance.
"Out of the proposed $16.01 billion assistance, $15.05 billion should be allocated for project assistance and $956 million for technical assistance, most of which will be in the form of grants," he said.
He refused to speculate on how much aid CGI is likely to extend to Indonesia for 1996/1997.
Rahardi also said yesterday that beginning this year, the government's Blue Book on project proposals will be issued in January, six months before CGI's annual meeting in Paris in July.
"We want to give CGI members more time to study the project proposals which they will support," he said. "Besides, the members have different fiscal years."
In the past years, copies of the Blue Book were distributed to the donors' representatives in Jakarta just a few days before the CGI meeting.
"As usual, this year's Blue Book describes the priorities of our development projects," Rahardi said, adding that the projects which are not taken up by the donors will be proposed again in the next annual meeting of the donor group.
Rahardi also said that this year's Blue Book has been compiled from 989 projects, 48 percent of which are new projects and 52 percent of which were listed in last year's Blue Book.
About 63.8 percent of the projects proposed this year are aimed to facilitate the country's economic development, he said.
He added that the first priority this year is the transportation, meteorology and geophysics sector, which has 71 projects valued at $3.57 billion or 17.8 percent of the total value of the whole projects.
About $3.39 billion or 16.9 percent of this year's total project value will be earmarked for 85 projects in the mining and energy sector. The third priority is 35 projects in the housing sector worth $2.28 billion (11.4 percent).
"In line with a commitment to use the scarce funds for development projects effectively, the government has excluded project proposals related to management information systems from the 1996 Blue Book," Rahardi said.
He said the government has also reduced the number of projects in the sectors of telecommunications and tourism as well as mining and energy due to successful new private investment participation in those two sectors. (icn)