Member Article

It is known that the effects of better infrastructures on a country’s economy are enormous and this fact has been widely recognised in the ambitious Strategic Development Plan laid down by the Government of East Timor, which highlights that the “policy framework to 2020 will ensure that Timor has quality national infrastructures in place by the end of this decade.”

More, the Development Plan refers that infrastructure investments constitute the second pillar of public leadership and that successful economic development must be based on strong national infrastructure including roads, power, telecommunications, air and sea ports, and urban infrastructure. 

The development of essential infrastructures is, therefore, a crucial pillar of the Government’s Plan in light of the country’s needs of fundamental infrastructures to support its rapidly growing economy. The Government revenues, including petroleum revenues, will support public spending of around US$1 billion per year, with the remainder accumulating in the Petroleum Fund.

As in many other sectors of the country’s economy, the civil and public construction sector is still to be developed as there are rather few competitive domestic companies and those that exist require both technical and technological backing and know-how. The opportunities for international civil and public construction companies, with experience on major infrastructures works, are therefore considerable. Also opportunities for partnerships that bring together technical and technological know-how and market experience are on the spotlight. 

In this context, we highlight the following opportunities for private investment in the infrastructures sector: 

1 - Roads and Bridges

East Timor has a system of national, regional and rural roads that offer access to the rural areas where most of the population live. The network was built following the Indonesian standard for carriageways and its width of 4.5 metre is clearly very narrow for international standards. 

Furthermore, the alignment of the roads does not meet safety standards and the construction of the shoulders and drainage is poor. There are around 456 bridges in East Timor’s road system, which is made up of two coast roads along the north and south coasts and five roads that cross the country and connect with the two coast roads. Approximately 90% of the road network is in bad  condition and requires urgent repair or reconstruction. 

The Government’s main priority is to rehabilitate and repair the existing roads in order to meet the minimum safety, quality and maintenance standards considering that the road network is the starting point for a country’s development, since transport of people and goods is a condition for a productive economy. 

Along with the rehabilitation of the existing roads, the implementation of a wide-ranging programme of construction of new roads and bridges is also a key element of the Government’s Plan to provide better access throughout the country. 

The Government’s objective is to conclude the rehabilitation of all national and district roads by 2020 (the Government program will pave at least 3,000 km of highway and district roads by 2015). The roads programme also includes the rehabilitation of all rural roads by 2015. 

Improved or new roads will certainly open East Timor to large-scale agribusiness and other  opportunities, will enable processing or other light manufacturing activities and will create ppportunities for tourism. 

 

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