Fed: Lag in funds slows East Timor rebuilding: bank

AAP General News (Australia)
04-11-2000
Fed: Lag in funds slows East Timor rebuilding: bank

MELBOURNE, April 11 AAP - Vital rebuilding projects in East Timor were being stalled
because of the slowness of some international aid donors to pay up, a key banker warned
in Melbourne today.

Sirpa Jarvenpaa (Sirpa Jarvenpaa), of the Asian Development Bank (ADB), said the lag
in funding meant a delay in jobs for desperately poor East Timorese, delays in rebuilding
and a danger that aid contracts could collapse.

The bank is responsible for major rebuilding projects including roads, power stations
and water in the wake of mass destruction in East Timor last year by departing Indonesian
occupation forces.

Ms Jarvenpaa, the bank's project economist and infrastructure specialist, told the
Austrade-sponsored seminar that East Timor Asia Development Bank projects had received
just $US7 million ($A11.8 million) out of a total required of nearly $US30 million ($A50.4
million).

"We hope that everyone gets up and puts in their money so we can start working," she
said in an interview.

"It's holding things up and it's putting an additional risk to the implementation of the project.

"Because, let's say we don't receive the full (US) $30 million that the project was
prepared for under the committed pledged funding and the share for this particular project,
then contracts will be at risk," she said.

"It's a little bit disappointing because otherwise we could go ahead with the larger
contracts right away, (with a) larger employment impact (to give jobs to East Timorese)."

Ms Jarvenpaa said Australia and Britain had paid up, but that "others are lagging".

A total of $US520 million ($A874 million) in aid has been pledged to East Timor, including
$US215 million ($A361 million) for rebuilding infrastructure, according to Graham Barrett
of the World Bank, which administers a donor trust fund.

Mr Barrett said the World Bank, which largely administers "soft aid" like health and
education, said work was moving quickly to design the territory's aid programs.

"At the moment, the money is flowing through (from donor nations), perhaps not as fast
as some people would like," Mr Barrett said.

The seminar was designed to inform Australian business of opportunities in taking part
in East Timor's rebuilding, through aid contracts and business investment.

AAP gf/er/arb/bwl

KEYWORD: TIMOR FUNDS

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