Capacity building assistance in the hydropower and mining project discussed
(KPL) High-ranking officials of the Ministry of Energy and Mining have met donors of the World Bank and AusAID to disseminate the project details and discuss to initial the technical assistance for capacity building for hydropower and mining projects in the next four years.
The hydropower and mining sectors have currently grown and contributed to the national economy by 12 per cent of the GDP in 2010 and expected to increase up to 15 per cent by 2015.
Their growth is also expected to climb to 30 per cent by 2020, according to a statement of Deputy Minister of Energy and Mining, Mr. Somboune Rasasombath at a workshop for the technical assistance for capacity building in the hydropower and mining projects in Vientiane last Friday.
The technical assistance for capacity building for hydropower and mining projects was granted US$8 million by the World Bank and US$3 million by the Australian Agency for International Development.
The project will operate from 2010 to 2014, aiming at increasing human resource capacity, improving regulations, performance of government overseeing institutions, curriculum, learning centre, lab and others.
The participants discussed and went further into details of each project’s main components such as joint hydropower and mining learning programme, hydropower sector development, mining sector development, and project administration and management.
The participants have joined discussion, consultation in order to identify the project direction and achieve the project goals through the encouragement to all implementing agencies including the competency of officials, the capacity of agencies in the hydropower and mining sectors at a certain level.
In the past, realising the importance and necessity of capacity building for the hydropower and mining sector in contribution to the implementation of the strategy for the development of the hydropower and mining sectors up to year 2020, the Ministry of Energy and Mining in collaboration with the World Bank thus prepared a Project Document Appraisal supported by the World Bank under the Project Preparation Advance Fund.
The appraisal was completed in December 2009 and subsequently approved and a financing agreement of US$8 million was then officially signed between the Lao government and the World Bank in February 2010.
In addition, the AusAID also confirmed to add AU$3 million to the project thereafter.
The energy and mining sectors are one of the main sources for the national budget, with an average growth of 20 per cent during 2006-2010.
Presently, there are 70 large energy projects and 154 mining projects operating in Laos.
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