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Plan panel pitch for PPP in schools - 11 Sep 2012 - Hindustan Times

Published On :2012-09-12 17:54:00

In a last ditch effort to attract private sector investment in schools and skill development, the Planning Commission on Tuesday held a meeting with top industry leaders presenting them with its Public Private Partnership model for these sectors.

Even though the private sectorshowed interest in the government's new PPP mode, government officials said they did not make any assurance on investments.

Planning Commission deputy chairperson Montek Singh Ahluwalia told the private sector that the government will be launching two schemes shortly for seeking PPP in presence of HRD minister Kapil Sibal and labour minister Mallikarjuna Kharge.

One would be HRD ministry's scheme for setting up 2,500 model schools and the other would be labour ministry's proposal to set up 3,000 Industrial Training Institutes in backward regions of India.

"The initiative in the first phase would involve setting up of 2,500 model schools to create capacity for quality education to about 40 lakh children," the plan panel said, in a presentation to the industry leaders.

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We have to spend more on health: Ahluwalia - 11 Sep 2012 - Live Mint

Published On :2012-09-12 17:53:00

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The deputy chairman of the Planning Commission, in an interview, spoke about the challenges of pushing public health reforms
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New Delhi: India is likely to finalize a draft Plan document next week to introduce universal health coverage in India. Montek Singh Ahluwalia, deputy chairman of the Planning Commission, spoke in an interview about the challenges of pushing public health reforms with limited resources at hand. Edited excerpts:

Will the government be able to push through sweeping healthcare reforms?

I don’t think the short-term problems of the economy should have any effect on the forward movement of health reforms. Steps are being taken to revive the economy and I am sure we will succeed. Meanwhile, we should keep our eyes on the medium term objective of developing a viable strategy for health sector reforms. One thing is clear, we have to spend more money on public health facilities and we will.

But money is not the only issue. We also have to use it well, and that means restructuring and reform of the public health system and also better regulation of health in general. However, health is a state subject and reforms will only take place depending on what the state governments want. Our job is to sensitize them and also support them in the 12th plan (2012-17). We do plan to do that.

Will you be able to achieve the spending target of 2.5% of GDP on healthcare?

We had said in the approach to the 12th plan that we should aim at that figure by the end of the 12th plan. But remember, the figure refers to plan and non-plan expenditure of the Centre and the states. The Planning Commission only decides central plan expenditure.

We discuss state plan expenditure but it is the states that decide, and non-plan expenditure, which is much larger than plan expenditure, is entirely outside our ambit. However, as an aspirational target, this is what the Centre and the states together should aim at.

What concerns you the most about India’s health sector?

Unlike other sectors, this is not a sector which can be left to market forces, even for those who have money. This is because information asymmetry is very high and incentives are not aligned.

Commercial health service providers do not have an incentive to take preventive steps—they make money if a patient goes for high end treatment, not if he or she takes preventive steps to avoid it. Lack of regulation is a major problem and there is a great deal of evidence of irrational prescriptions, and also substandard facilities.

Second, we have a very large population which simply cannot afford private care, so there has to be a large expansion in public sector health. At least 80% of the population needs to have access to good healthcare funding by the public sector. This could be through direct provision of services by public facilities, as is inevitably needed in rural areas. It could involve some PPP (public-private partnership) as some state governments are doing. It could be through a health insurance system such as Rashtriya Swasthya Bima Yojana (a government-run national health insurance scheme for the poor), where the government pays the premium. I am sure states will make different choices and we should give them flexibility.

Third, trained personnel are as important as money and we have huge shortages of doctors as well as nurses. Unless we expand supply, not much can be done by simply building facilities.

The 12th five-year plan attempts to put together a strategy which should lead to large scale expansion of public health sector in rural and urban slum areas. But it will take time.

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Govt to speed up projects worth `3.3 lakh cr to revive growth - 11 Sep 2012 - Financial Chronicle

Published On :2012-09-12 14:43:00

 

 

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Includes pending PSU proposals in roads and petroleum sectors
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Government would fast track infrastructure projects of Rs 3.3 lakh crore to revive the slowing economy. These would include projects pending with public sector undertakings along with those stuck in roads and petroleum sectors.

Besides, it will shortly come up with a framework on public-private-partnership for setting up warehouses in the country along with government tempering with buffer food stock to ensure that food prices do not go beyond comfort level.

This is part of the five priority areas that the government has identified to boost investor confidence in the economy in a time bound manner. “Government has identified problems that are delaying several big projects in roads and petroleum sector where the estimated investments locked up is to the tune of Rs 1,50,000 crore. Finance minister wants to take this up at the cabinet level for decision that would be taken in a time bound manner,” economic affairs secretary Arvind Mayaram said while addressing the national executive committee meeting of Ficci.

As per Mayaram, finance minister will also meet heads of nine identified public sector under takings that are sitting on large cash reserves of Rs 1,80,000 crore, on Wednesday to put in place a timeline for beginning the projects that have been put on hold.

The economic growth rate in the country has fallen consistently every quarter since last year and stood at 5.5 per cent in the April-June quarter of this financial year on the back of poor performance of manufacturing, mining and farm sectors against growth of 8 per cent in the first quarter of 2011-12. This is far less than the GDO growth projections of 6.7 per cent by the prime minister’s economic advisory council.

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Odisha approves 37 projects on PPP mode in three years - 10 Sep 2012 - Business Standard

Published On :2012-09-12 14:42:00

 

 

Odisha has approved 37 projects on the public private partnership (PPP) mode between April 2009 and March 2012.

The approved projects are in sectors like ports, real estate, food processing and tourism.

The state government has approved the establishment of a minor port at Astaranga in Puri district by Hyderabad-based Navyug Engineering Ltd. The initial port capacity is 25 million tonnes per annum (mtpa) with the project cost pegged at Rs 7417 crore.

The port capacity will be eventually scaled up to 70 mtpa.

It may be noted that the state government had entered into a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with the company on December 22, 2008. A concession agreement was signed on November 22, 2010 according to which the port developer will share five per cent of its gross income during the first five years, eight per cent from fifth to the 10th year, 10 per cent from 11th to 15th year and 12 per cent from the 16th year to the end of the lease period.

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Vinayak Chatterjee: Weakest link in the power chain - 03 Sep 2012 - Business Standard

Published On :2012-09-07 17:51:00

Without doubt, distribution is the weakest link in the entire power sector value chain — fuels, logistics, generation, transmission and distribution.

The medium-term “fuels” outlook for our coal-dominated energy sector is beginning to look less scary. The demand for coal is expected rise to 980.50 million tonnes by 2017. The domestic availability of coal has been pegged at 795 million tonnes. This demand-supply gap of around 200 million tonnes is expected to be made up substantially by imports by 2016-17. On imports, the “sarkar” is gearing up functionally and administratively, according to latest reports coming from the Prime Minister’s Office. An inter-ministerial group is preparing public-private partnership schemes for roping in the private sector for coal mining. The brouhaha over the Comptroller and Auditor General’s report has got political parties to broadly agree to de-nationalise coal mining. The price of coal has fallen by 40 per cent in international markets and 65,000 Mw of thermal plants in the US are shifting to gas by 2016. Political and administrative decisions on import-aggregation, pooled pricing and tariff pass-through, have, for all practical purposes, been taken.

A significant amount of capacity is stranded owing to the non-availability of gas. Rising demand and falling domestic production has pushed the share of imported gas to 40 per cent of the current consumption in India. The US has turned into a net energy exporter on the back of huge quantities of shale gas and oil becoming available commercially. Washington, however, allows gas exports only to free-trade agreement partners. New Delhi has asked Washington for special exemption that will allow Indian companies to import liquid gas in ships from the US. With increased gas imports and the KG D6 impasse likely to be resolved, there is hope in the medium term.

On the logistics front, serious issues remain on the efficiency and capacity of railways and ports to handle 200 metric tonnes of imported coal. Liquefied natural gas, or LNG, terminals to receive imported gas require augmentation as well as pipelines across the country. These are capital investment and project execution challenges that are largely under the Centre’s control. Already, there are clear signs of new capacity being built.

Generation targets look eminently doable. The target for power capacity addition during the 12th Plan period is 88,000 Mw. With about 60,000 Mw under execution, this 88 Gw should be achieved after hitting 55 Gw in the 11th Plan.

Transmission, after the grid collapse in early August, surfaced to attention. However, other than this kind of an episodic event, it has not done badly. The existing inter-regional power transfer capacity was targeted to be raised to 37,150 Mw by the end of the 11th Plan period. Power Grid was the only company from the power sector to have met its investment target during the 11th Plan. Its pace of investment was higher compared to the generation sector. Its expenditure outlay was Rs 6,000 crore in Ninth Plan, Rs 18,000 crore in 10th Plan, Rs 55,000 crore in 11th Plan, and now Rs 100,000 crore in the 12th Plan. Along with its wholly-owned subsidiary, Power Systems Operation Corporation – which manages the Regional Load Dispatch Centres and the National Load Dispatch Centre – transmission is certainly not the major fault line. Plans are in place for strengthening the regional grid links to the national power grid to support the generation capacity addition of 88 Gw. The phasing out of the current Unscheduled Interchange format and the implementation of Special Protection Schemes will all add to the robustness of the grid.

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