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Government Supports Planned Electricity Tariff Increases
Friday, 23 September, 2005 | 13:56 WIB

TEMPO Interactive, Jakarta:The Indonesian government supports the plan of the State Electricity Company (PLN) to increase the basic electricity tariffs in stages during 2006.

PLN already discussed this together with the government sometime ago.

Minister of Energy and Mineral Resources Purnomo Yusgiantoro said that in principle the government did not consider the plan to be a problem, especially as a similar plan was implemented back in 1990.

“If this system can be accepted, that will be good,” said Yusgiantoro in Jakarta on Wednesday (21/09).

The Minister went on to say that in order to put this plan into realization, PLN must ask for approval from the House of Representatives (DPR) as it was very much related to the subsidy budget within the State Budget.

As regards the electricity tariffs adjustment, according to Yusgiantoro, PLN must first review several factors, including the purchase of private electricity, the Rupiah exchange value, the inflation rate, fuel prices and production costs.

“We now need to evaluate whether or not these factors have changed following current growth,” he continued.

However, PLN’s director for power plants generation and primary energy, Ali Herman Ibrahim, confirmed that these factors could still be used. (Retno Sulistyowati/M Fasabeni-Tempo News Room)